THE 

SOUTHWESTERN  POUTICAL  SCIENCE 

QUARTERLY 

Vol.  I  MARCH,  1921  No.  4 

Managing  Editor 

C.  G.  Haines 
University  of  Texas 

Associate  Editor 

H.  G.  James 

University  of  Texas 

Members  of  Editorial  Board 
F.  F.  Blachly,  University  of  Oklahoma 

C.  F.  COAN,  University  of  New  Mexico 
M.  S.  Handman,  University  of  Texas 

D.  Y.  Thomas,  University  of  Arkansas 


CONTENTS 

The  states  as  Agents  of  the  Nation     -    -     A.  N.  Holcombe  307 

Training  for  Social  Service  in  the  South    -    -    E.  B.  Reuter  328 
A  Review  of  the  Minimum   Wage  Theory  and   Practice, 

With  Special  Reference  to  Texas    -    W.  M.  W.  Splawn  339 

The  Relation  of  Economics  to  History    -    -     -     CD.  Johns  372 

Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs 

Edited   by   Herman   G.   James  380 

The  Executive  Office  in  the  Latin- American  Consti- 
tutions      Ethel  M.  Crampton  380 

Central   American    Federation 397 

News  and  Notes Edited  by  W.  C.  Binkley  408 


PUBLISHED  QUARTERLY  BY 

THE  SOUTHWESTERN  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 
ASSOCIATION 
Austin,  Texas 

"Entered  as  second-class  matter  January  10,  1921,  at  the  postoffice  at 
Austin,  Texas,  under  the  Act  of  March  3,  1879." 


The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Association 

PRESIDENT 
George  Vaughan,  Little  Rock,  Arkansas 

FIRST  VICE-PRESIDENT 
George  B.  Dealey,  Dallas,  Texas 

SECOND   VICE-PRESIDENT 
F.  F.  Blachly,  Norman,  Oklahoma 

THIRD  VICE-PRESIDENT 
D.  Y.  Thomas,  Fayetteville,  Arkansas 

SECRETARY  AND  TREASURER 
W.   C.   Binkley,   Austin,   Texas 


EXECUTIVE  COUNCIL 

,  President  George  Vaughan,  Little  Rock,  Arkansas 
Ex-President  H.  G.  James,  Austin,  Texas 
Ex-President  A.  P.  Wooldridge,  Austin,  Texas 
Vice-President  George  B.  Dealey,  Dallas,  Texas 
Vice-President  F.  F.  Blachly,  Norman,  Oklahoma 
Vice-President  D.  Y.  Thomas,  Fayetteville,  Arkansas 
Editor  of  Quarterly  C.  G.  Haines,  Austin,  Texas 
Secretary  and  Treasurer  W.  C.  Binkley,  Austin,  Texas 
„  ,,  f  E.  T.  Miller,  Austin,  Texas 

Elected  Members      |  ^   g  ^^^^^^^  ^^^  0^1^^^^^  Louisiana 

The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly  is  supplied  to 
all  members  of  the  Southwestern  Political  Science  Association.  The 
subscription  price  of  the  Quarterly  is  two  dollars  a  year.  Applica- 
tions for  membership,  orders  for  the  Quarterly  and  remittances 
should  be  addressed  to  W.  C.  Binkley,  Secretary-Treasurer  of  the 
Association,  University  Station,  Austin,  Texas. 

Correspondence  with  reference  to  contributions  to  the  Quarterly 
should  be  addressed  to  C.  G.  Haines,  Managing  Editor,  University 
Station,  Austin,  Texas. 


At  Libi 


THE 

SOUTHWESTERN  POLITICAL  SCIENCE 

QUARTERLY 

Vol.  I  MARCH,  1921  No.  4 

The  editors  disclaim  responsibility  for  views  expressed  by  contributors 
to  The  Quarterly 


THE  STATES  AS  AGENTS  OF  THE  NATION.^ 

A.  N.  HOLCOMBE 
Harvard  University 

Major  General  Enoch  H.  Crowder,  Provost  Marshal  Gen- 
eral of  the  United  States  during  the  World  War,  in  his  ad- 
mirable volume,  The  Spint  of  Selective  Service,  relates  how 
the  federal  military  authorities  came  to  make  use  of  the 
States  as  agents  of  the  Nation  for  the  recruiting  of  the  na- 
tional army.  They  had  all  but  decided  that  men  within  the 
draft-age  should  register  at  the  post-offices  in  their  respec- 
tive places  of  residence.  The  post-masters  are  generally 
well  acquainted  with  the  people  of  their  districts.  Through- 
out the  rural  districts,  indeed,  the  post-office  is  often  the 
principal  social  center,  and  in  the  urban  districts,  though 
the  personal  relations  between  postmaster  and  public  are 
less  intimate  than  in  the  country,  there  are  well-establishecj 
and  adequate  facilities  for  the  prompt  and  complete  regis- 
tration of  the  adult  male  population.  Then  a  Congressman 
suggested  that  the  spirit  of  selective  service  would  be  more 
effectively  fostered  if  the  registration  took  place  at  the  polls 
instead  of  the  post-offices.  Men  go  to  the  polls  in  a  loftier 
state  of  mind  than  that  in  which  they  go  for  their  mail. 


^Paper   presented   at  the   Second   Annual   Meeting   of   the   Souths 
western  Political  Science  Association,  March  24,  1921. 


308      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

Patriotic  sentiments  are  more  closely  associated  with  the 
l)allot.  There  had  been  grave  differences  of  opinion  concern- 
ing the  necessity  of  war,  and  it  was  hoped  that  men  within 
the  draft-age  would  better  appreciate  the  dignity  of  regis- 
tration, if  the  act  were  performed  in  the  place  where  the 
voice  of  the  people  speaks  in  the  fullness  of  its  majesty.  So 
the  post-office  was  rejected  as  the  birth-place  of  the  national 
army. 

But  the  polling-places  are  under  State,  not  federal,  con- 
trol. The  choice  of  the  polls,  therefore,  as  the  scene  of 
the  first  step  in  the  recruitment  of  the  national  army  meant 
the  choice  of  the  States  as  the  national  recruiting  agents. 
It  meant  that  the  local  and  district  draft  boards  would  be 
composed  of  men  appointed  by  the  State  authorities  and 
that  the  whole  process  of  selection  would  be  in  the  hands  of 
men  responsible  primarily  to  the  States  rather  than  to  the 
federal  government.  The  boldness  of  this  decision  has  been 
forgotten  in  the  success  to  which  it  led.  But  success  was 
by  no  means  assured  in  advance.  The  general  practice  of 
the  federal  government  has  been  to  depend  on  agents  who 
are  subject  immediately  and  directly  to  federal  control. 
The  federal  taxes  are  collected  not  by  State  but  by  federal 
collectors  of  customs  and  of  internal  revenue.  The  federal 
police  power  is  entrusted  to  the  United  States  marshals  and 
to  the  host  of  intelligence  officers,  secret  service  men,  and 
agents  of  Bureaus  of  Investigation  in  the  direct  employ  of 
the  United  States.  The  great  constructive  services  of  the 
federal  government,  from  farm  loans  to  weather  reports, 
are  conducted  mainly  by  federal  officers  in  complete  inde- 
pendence of  the  authority  and  influence  of  the  States.  The 
decision  to  confide  the  administration  of  the  Selective  Ser- 
vice Act  so  largely  to  officers  of  the  States  was  an  extra- 
ordinary exception  to  the  established  policy  of  the  federal 
government. 

The  complete  separation  of  federal  and  state  administra- 
tion was  not  contemplated  by  the  founders  of  the  "more 
perfect  Union"  of  1787.  James  Madison,  the  foremost  ar- 
chitect of  the  federal  Constitution,  arguing  in  The  Federalist 
that  the  new  form  of  government  would  not  be  dangerous 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  309 

to  the  State  governments,  advanced  as  one  of  his  reasons 
the  proposition  that  the  State  governments  were  to  be  re- 
garded as  constituent  and  essential  parts  of  the  federal  gov- 
ernment, although  the  latter  would  be  in  no  wise  essential 
to  the  organization  or  operation  of  the  former.  The  num- 
ber of  individuals  employed  under  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States,  he  believed,  would  be  much  smaller  than  the 
number  employed  under  the  particular  States.  To  illus- 
trate his  thought,  he  cited  the  case  of  the  collection  of  rev- 
enue. "If  the  federal  government  is  to  have  collectors  of 
revenue,"  he  wrote,  "the  State  governments  will  have  theirs 
also  .  .  .  Those  of  the  former  will  be  principally  on  the 
sea-coast,  and  not  very  numerous,  whilst  those  of  the  latter 
will  be  spread  over  the  face  of  the  country,  and  will  be 
very  numerous.  .  .  It  is  true  that  the  Confederacy  is  to  pos- 
sess, and  may  exercise,  the  power  of  collecting  internal  as 
well  as  external  taxes  throughout  the  States ;  but  it  is  prob- 
able that  this  power  will  not  be  resorted  to,  except  for  supple- 
mental purposes  of  revenue ;  and  that  an  option  will  then  be 
given  to  the  States  to  supply  their  quotas  by  previous  collec- 
tions of  their  own ;  and  that  the  eventual  collection  under  the 
immediate  authority  of  the  Union  will  generally  be  made  by 
the  officers,  and  according  to  the  rules,  appointed  by  the  sev- 
eral States. . .  "  So  far  was  the  wisest  political  scientist  of  his 
time  from  foreseeing  the  present  development  of  federal 
fiscal  machinery. 

The  most  significant  feature  of  Madison's  argument  is 
not  his  pardonable  failure  to  anticipate  correctly  the  future 
in  America,  but  his  easy  assumption  that  the  federal  govern- 
ment would  utilize  the  services  of  State  officers  in  the  execu- 
tion of  federal  powers.  Nor  was  he  alone  among  the  more 
eminent  framers  of  the  federal  Constitution  in  holding  this 
opinion.  In  the  federal  convention  itself  the  younger  Pinck- 
ney  voiced  the  same  idea  when  he  declared  that  the  States 
would  be  "the  instruments  upon  which  the  Union  must  fre- 
quently depend  for  the  support  and  execution  of  its  power." 
Hamilton  expressed  a  like  opinion  when  he  wrote  in  The 
Federalist  that  the  officers  of  the  States  would  be  "rendered 
auxiliary"  to  the  enforcement  of  the  laws  of  the  Union. 


310     The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

Doubtless  most  of  the  Fathers  were  confirmed  in  this  way 
of  thinking  by  the  provisions  of  Article  Six  of  the  federal 
Constitution  relating  to  the  supremacy  of  the  Constitution 
and  laws  of  the  Union  and  to  the  administration  of  oaths 
to  the  officers  of  the  States,  binding  them  to  support  the  fed- 
eral Constitution.  Now  the  successful  administration  of  the 
Selective  Service  Act  so  largely  by  the  aid  of  State  officers 
revives  the  interest  of  political  scientists  in  these  early  spec- 
ulations concerning  the  function  of  the  States  as  agents  of 
the  Nation. 

There  are  five  separate  cases  in  which  the  States  may  act 
as  agents  of  the  Nation. 

The  first  is  that  in  which  the  agency  is  expressly  imposed 
upon  them  by  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States.  Each 
State  shall  appoint  its  quota  of  presidential  electors  in  such 
manner  as  its  legislature  shall  direct;  and  the  State  legis- 
latures shall  prescribe  the  times,  places  and  manner  of  hold- 
ing elections  for  Senators  and  Representatives,  subject  to 
the  power  of  the  Congress  to  make  or  alter  such  regulations. 
The  States  also  play  an  essential  part  in  the  process  of  con- 
stitutional amendment.  It  cannot  be  affirmed  that  the 
States  have  proved  satisfactory  agents  in  the  performance 
of  these  electoral  functions.  The  system  of  presidential 
election  established  by  the  f  ramers  of  the  Constitution  broke 
down  at  the  first  real  trial.  The  party  organizations  trans- 
ferred the  decisive  influence  from  the  legislature  to  the  elec- 
torates, and  after  the  rise  of  the  national  nominating  con- 
vention in  the  Jacksonian  era  the  legislature  did  not  venture 
even  to  make  nominations.  The  principal  result  of  reliance 
upon  the  agency  of  the  States  in  the  choice  of  presidents  is 
to  saddle  the  country  with  the  system  of  election  by  general 
ticket.  This  general  ticket  system  gives  the  larger  States  an 
undue  influence  under  ordinary  circumstances  and  has  pro- 
duced serious  evils  which  are  too  well  known  to  require  de- 
tailed consideration.  If,  however,  through  a  division  of  the 
electoral  votes  between  several  candidates,  an  election  should 
be  thrown  into  the  House  of  Representatives,  the  unit  rule 
would  operate  in  an  exactly  contrary  manner  and  give  the 
smaller  States  an  influence  greatly  disproportionate  to  their 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  311 

population  and  importance.  This  might  under  readily  con- 
ceivable circumstances  bring  disaster  to  the  Nation. 

The  excessive  inequality  between  the  large  and  small 
States  renders  the  States  no  less  unsuited  for  the  perform- 
ance of  their  other  political  functions  as  agents  of  the  Na- 
tion. The  eight  States  of  the  arid  and  mountainous  West, 
for  example,  though  possessing  only  fourteen  Congressmen, 
less  than  a  thirtieth  of  the  total,  have  a  sixth  of  all  the  Sen- 
ators. Such  a  disparity  of  population  and  political  influence 
threatened  to  produce  consequences  when  the  silver  question 
was  the  dominant  issue  in  national  politics,  and  may  in  the 
future  produce  graver  consequences.  It  would  be  possible 
for  States  possessing  only  one-twelfth  of  the  Congressmen, 
through  their  disproportionate  representation  in  the  Senate, 
to  prevent  the  submission  of  a  constitutional  amendment, 
and  for  States  possessing  only  one-twentieth  of  the  Con- 
gressmen to  prevent  its  ratification.  Such  inequitable  re- 
sults are  unlikely,  but  a  system  under  which  they  are  pos- 
sible is  a  menace.  Even  if  these  results  should  never  ma- 
terialize, the  inconvenience  of  leaving  the  management  of 
presidential  elections  to  the  States  is  enough  to  condemn  the 
system  which  utilizes  the  States  as  political  agents  of  the  Na- 
tion and  would  justify  the  exclusive  regulation  of  national 
elections  by  the  federal  government,  but  for  the  difficulty  in 
settling  the  suffrage  problem. 

The  second  case  in  which  the  States  may  act  as  agents  of 
the  Nation  is  that  in  which  the  Congress  is  expressly  au- 
thorized to  utilize  the  services  of  the  States,  if  it  wishes, 
though  no  duty  is  imposed  upon  them  directly  by  the  Consti- 
tution. The  Congress,  for  instance,  has  power  to  call  forth 
the  militia  to  execute  the  laws  of  the  Union,  suppress  insur- 
rections, and  repel  invasions.  The  utilization  of  the  militia, 
however,  for  national  purposes  has  never  proved  satisfac- 
tory, and  the  federal  government,  when  in  need  of  forces  to 
supplement  the  national  army,  has  generally  preferred  to 
reorganize  the  militia  as  an  integral  part  of  the  national 
military  establishment  or  recruit  additional  forces  without 
regard  to  the  military  establishments  of  the  States.  Prior 
to  the  enactment  of  the  Selective  Service  law  the  recruit- 


312      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

merit  of  national  forces  was  conducted  by  the  federal  gov- 
ernment and  little  or  no  attempt  was  made  to  utilize  the 
agency  of  the  States.  After  the  Spanish  War  an  attempt 
was  made  to  render  the  militia  a  more  serviceable  second 
line  of  defence  through  the  grant  of  federal  subsidies  to  the 
States  to  be  expended  under  the  supervision  of  the  federal 
military  authorities,  but  the  results  obtained  down  to  the 
World  War  were  not  regarded  as  satisfactory.  In  general 
.the  federal  government  has  been  much  more  successful  as 
the  agent  of  the  States  for  their  protection  against  domestic 
violence  than  the  States  have  been  as  agents  of  the  Nation 
for  the  national  defense.  The  tendency  therefore  is  for  the 
States  to  rely  more  and  more  upon  the  federal  government 
for  police  protection  and  for  the  Nation  to  rely  less  and  less 
upon  the  States  as  agencies  Of  national  defence. 

The  third  case  in  which  the  States  may  act  as  agents  of  the 
Nation  is  that  in  which  the  Congress  imposes  duties  of  a 
character  not  prohibited,  though  not  explicitly  authorized,  by 
the  federal  Constitution.  The  first  important  instance  in 
which  the  Congress  ventured  to  utilize  the  services  of  the 
States  in  this  manner  without  a  clear  constitutional  mandate 
was  its  enactment  of  the  fugitive  slave  law  of  1793.  The 
Constitution  had  provided  that  any  person  held  to  service  or 
labor  in  any  State  under  the  laws  thereof  and  escaping  into 
another  State  should  be  delivered  up  on  claim  of  the  party  to 
whom  such  service  or  labor  might  be  due.  It  did  not  say  by 
whom  such  person  should  be  delivered  up  nor  in  what  man- 
ner the  delivery  should  be  effected.  It  did  say,  however,  that 
no  fugitive  should  be  discharged  from  his  servile  condition 
because  of  any  law  or  regulation  of  the  State  into  which  he 
should  escape.  An  obvious  inference  is  that  the  State  into 
which  the  fugitive  should  escape  was  to  be  held  responsible 
for  his  rendition,  if  found  therein  by  the  claimant.  This 
opinion  was  held  by  no  less  an  authority  than  Webster.  In 
his  famous  Seventh  of  March  speech  he  said,  referring  to 
the  clause,  that  he  "had  always  thought  that  the  Constitution 
addressed  itself  to  the  legislature  of  the  States  or  to  the 
States  themselves."  When  it  said  that  the  fugitives  should 
be  "delivered  up,"  he  was  of  the  opinion  that  this  was  an 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  313 

injunction  upon  the  States,  and  that  they  should  cause  the 
fugitives  to  be  delivered  up.  The  Congress  which  passed  the 
original  fugitive  slave  law  was  evidently  of  a  like  opinion. 
But  in  the  great  case  of  Prigg  versus  Pennsylvania,  decided 
by  the  Supreme  Court  in  1842,  it  was  held  that  the  obligation 
to  secure  the  return  of  fugitive  slaves  lay  upon  the  federal 
government  and  not  upon  the  States.  The  act  of  1793  con- 
ferred authority  upon  both  federal  and  State  judges  to  sanc- 
tion the  rendition  of  fugitives  when  duly  claimed  by  their 
masters.  As  to  the  authority  conferred  upon  the  federal 
judges.  Justice  Story,  speaking  for  the  Court,  said  that  there 
could  be  no  doubt  of  the  power  of  the  Congress  to  charge 
federal  officers  with  the  enforcement  of  the  law.  As  to  the 
authority  conferred  upon  State  magistrates,  he  continued. 
**while  a  difference  of  opinion  has  existed,  and  may  exist 
still  on  the  point  in  different  States  whether  State  magis- 
rates  are  bound  to  act  under  it,  none  is  entertained  by  this 
court  that  State  magistrates  may,  if  they  choose,  exercise 
that  authority,  unless  prohibited  by  State  legislation."  Thus 
the  obligations  lying  upon  the  States  as  agents  of  the  Na- 
tion were  left  obscure,  and  the  efficacy  of  State  action  ren- 
dered uncertain.  Justice  McLean,  in  a  separate  concurring 
opinion,  stated  his  conclusion  on  this  point  more  clearly  than 
Justice  Story  had  done.  "It  appears,"  he  said,  "in  the  case 
under  consideration,  that  the  State  magistrate,  before  whom 
the  fugitive  was  brought,  refused  to  act.  In  my  judgment 
he  was  bound  to  perform  the  duty  required  of  him  by  a  law 
paramount  to  any  act  on  the  same  subject  in  his  own  State." 
Justice  McLean,  though  stating  thus  strongly  the  duty  of 
State  officers  in  this  case  to  act  as  agents  of  the  Nation,  con- 
ceded that  if  a  State  officer  refused  to  perform  his  duty,  the 
claimant  would  have  no  recourse  but  to  take  his  fugitive 
before  the  nearest  federal  judge.  He  did  not  consider  the 
further  question,  whether  the  federal  government,  assum- 
ing that  it  had  the  power  to  authorize  State  officers  to  act  as 
its  agents  in  such  cases,  had  the  power  also  to  compel  them 
to  perform  the  duties  resulting  from  such  agency.  The  ma- 
jority of  the  Court,  however,  were  not  ready  to  assert  even 
that  the  Congress  had  the  power  to  make  State  officers  fed- 
eral agents  for  the  enforcement  of  the  fugitive  slave  law. 


314     The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Qimrterly 

Hence,  when  enacting  the  more  stringent  fugitive  slave  law 
of  1850,  the  Congress  confided  the  enforcement  of  the  law 
entirely  to  federal  ofldcers.  The  attempt  to  make  the  States 
agents  of  the  Nation  was  abandoned.  The  inference  is  that 
the  claim  to  a  right  to  do  so  was  itself  surrendered. 

The  history  of  the  clause  of  the  federal  Constitution  relat- 
ing to  the  return  of  fugitives  from  justice  tends  to  confirm 
this  inference.  That  clause  provides  that  a  person  charged 
in  any  State  with  any  crime  who  shall  flee  from  justice  and 
be  found  in  another  State  shall  on  demand  of  the  executive 
authority  of  the  State  from  which  he  fled  be  delivered  up, 
to  be  removed  to  the  State  having  jurisdiction  of  the  crime 
The  act  of  1793,  providing  for  the  rendition  of  fugitive 
slaves,  also  prescribed  the  mode  in  which  the  demand  should 
be  made  for  the  return  of  fugitives  from  justice.  In  such 
cases  demand  was  to  be  made  of  the  chief  executive  of  the 
State  in  which  the  fugitive  might  be  found.  But  when,  in 
the  celebrated  case  of  Kentucky  versus  Dennison,  a  State 
sought  the  aid  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States 
to  secure  the  return  of  a  person  charged  with  the  crime  of 
aiding  a  slave  to  escape,  since  the  Governor  of  Ohio  was  un- 
willing to  deliver  him  up  on  demand,  as  provided  by  the 
law,  the  Supreme  Court  refused  to  interfere.  It  held,  as 
Justice  McLean  had  been  disposed  to  hold  in  the  Prigg  case, 
that  the  State  officers  ought  to  perform  the  duty  imposed 
upon  them  by  the  act  of  Congress.  But  they  could  not  be 
constrained  by  the  federal  government  to  return  a  fugitive 
from  justice,  if  they  chose  to  disregard  their  obligation  to  do 
so.  In  other  words,  the  Supreme  Court  distinguished  be- 
tween a  legal  and  a  moral  obligation.  The  former  was  en- 
forceable ;  the  latter  was  not.  The  obligation  imposed  upon 
the  States  by  the  Constitution  in  respect  to  fugitives  from 
justice  was  of  the  latter  character.  This  decision  greatly  im- 
paired the  usefulness  of  the  States  as  agents  of  the  Nation 
in  all  cases  of  this  kind. 

The  court  over  which  Chief  Justice  Taney  presided  was 
apparently  unwilling  to  come  to  any  decision  which  might 
seem  to  uphold  the  doctrine  that  the  federal  government 
ccv-ld  coerce  a  sovereign  state.    That  may  explain  its  reluc- 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  315 

tance  to  enforce  against  the  officers  of  a  state  the  constitu- 
tional mandate  that  a  fugitive  from  justice  shall  be  de- 
livered up  on  demand  of  the  executive  of  the  state  from 
which  he  fled.  Be  that  as  it  may,  the  power  to  harbor  fugi- 
tives from  justice  has  not  been  so  abused  by  the  state  ex- 
ecutives as  to  give  rise  to  serious  grievances,  and  Congress 
has  not  found  it  necessary  to  pass  a  federal  fugitives  from 
justice  act,  which  would  provide  special  federal  machinery 
for  the  rendition  of  such  fugitives.  It  is  a  fair  question, 
moreover,  whether  the  federal  Supreme  Court  would  now 
hold,  as  Taney's  court  did,  that  a  State  cannot  be  compelled 
to  discharge  an  obligation  imposed  upon  it  by  the  Con- 
stitution of  the  United  States.  The  latest  case  in  which 
this  question  was  involved  was  the  action  by  the  State  of  Vir- 
ginia against  West  Virginia  to  compel  the  assumption  by 
the  latter  of  its  share  of  the  Virginian  debt,  as  it  stood  at 
the  date  of  the  separation  of  West  Virginia  from  Virginia. 
In  this  case  the  Supreme  Court  awarded  judgment  for  sev- 
eral millions  of  dollars  to  Virginia.  West  Virginia  was  sc 
slow  in  honoring  this  award  that  Virginia  asked  the  Supreme 
court  to  execute  its  judgment  by  any  efficacious  judicial  pro- 
cess within  its  power.  The  Supreme  Court  tried  to  avoid  the 
issue  presented  by  this  plea  by  granting  West  Virginia  re- 
peated extensions  of  time  for  satisfying  the  claim.  Finally, 
however,  as  West  Virginia  continued  to  procrastinate  and 
it  was  evident  that  further  delay  would  bring  the  authority 
of  the  Supreme  Court  in  such  cases  into  contempt,  the  Court 
was  forced  to  consider  whether  there  was  not  some  form  of 
federal  execution  which  could  be  employed  to  compel  West 
Virginia  to  satisfy  the  judgment.  The  court  even  went  sc 
far  as  to  order  West  Virginia  to  appear  and  show  cause  why 
its  property  should  not  be  seized,  or  its  citizens  required  to 
pay  a  special  assessment  of  some  sort,  in  satisfaction  of  the 
judgment.  At  this  point,  after  more  than  ten  years  of  eva- 
sion, the  West  Virginia  legislature  made  provisions  for  as- 
suming its  share  of  the  debt. 

It  is  not  clear,  therefore,  how  much  authority  the.  cases 
of  Prigg  versus  Pennsylvania  and  Kentucky  versus  Denni- 
son  retain  at  this  time.    If  it  be  conceded,  as  was  asserted 


316      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

by  the  majority  of  the  court  in  the  earlier  case,  that  the 
mandate  of  the  Constitution  is  not  directed  against  the  states 
but  against  the  Union,  and  that  federal,  not  state  officers  are 
those  on  whom  the  obligation  lies  to  secure  the  rendition  of 
fugitives,  or  that,  though  directed  against  the  states,  it  is 
not  enforceable  by  any  legal  process  within  the  control  of 
the  federal  government,  then  it  is  not  necessary  to  consider 
how  much  power,  if  any,  the  federal  government  may  pos- 
sess to  constrain  the  state  governments  to  discharge  the 
obligation.  But  if  on  the  contrary,  it  be  true,  as  Webster 
and  doubtless  also  most  of  the  framers  of  the  Constitution 
believed,  that  the  mandate  of  the  Constitution  in  such  cases 
is  directed  against  the  states,  the  only  conclusion  that  is  now 
possible  is,  that  the  nature  and  extent  of  the  power  of  federal 
execution  in  such  cases  has  not  yet  been  disclosed.  In  view 
of  this  uncertainty  it  would  be  imprudent  for  the  federal 
government  to  rely  on  the  agency  of  the  states  for  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  laws  of  the  Nation,  except  in  extraordi- 
nary cases,  like  that  of  the  Selective  Service  Act,  where  the 
exceptional  force  of  patriotic  sentiment  may  be  expected  to 
offset  the  deficiency  in  the  force  of  the  law  itself. 

The  fourth  case  in  which  the  states  may  act  as  agents  of 
the  Nation  is  that  in  which  they  voluntarily  untertake  du- 
ties neither  required  of  them  by  the  federal  Constitution  nor 
imposed  upon  them  by  the  Congress.  Assuming  that  what 
is  not  expressly  prohibited  to  the  states  is  within  their  power, 
even  if  not  explicitly  or  implicitly  reserved  to  them,  they 
should  be  able  to  assist  the  federal  government  in  the  per- 
formance of  many  duties  not  now  regarded  as  necessarily 
within  the  sphere  of  state  action.  Such  a  broad  constmiction 
of  the  Constitution,  if  tenable,  would  open  up  a  wide  field  for 
state  action.  They  might,  for  example,  regulate  interstate 
and  foreign  commerce,  in  sir>  far  as  cheir  regulations  did  not 
conflict  with  those  of  the  federal  government,  legislate  on  the 
subject  of  naturalization  and  bankruptcies,  fix  the  standards 
of  weights  and  measures,  establish  post-offices  and  post 
roads,  and  issue  state  patents  and  copyrights,  conferring  ex- 
clusive privileges  upon  inventors  and  authors  within  their 
several  jurisdictions.    In  fact  the  states  have  exercised  some 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  317 

of  the  powers  within  this  field  and  have  attempted  to  exercise 
others.  The  federal  Supreme  Court  has  sanctioned  a  part  of 
this  legislation  and  has  condemned  the  rest.  In  some  cases 
it  has  held  that  the  absence  of  federal  legislation  with  respect 
to  a  certain  subject,  over  which  exclusive  jurisdiction  has 
not  been  expressly  conferred  by  the  Constitution  upon  the 
Congress  of  the  United  States  nor  concurrent  jurisdiction 
explicitly  denied  to  the  states,  has  the  effect  of  leaving  the 
field  open  to  the  states.  In  such  cases  state  legislation  has 
been  sustained  by  the  federal  courts.  Thus  state  insolvency 
laws  were  sustained  in  the  absence  of  a  national  bankruptcy 
act.  Much  state  legislation  in  regulation  of  interstate  and 
foreign  commerce  has  also  been  sustained  under  similar  cir- 
cumstances. In  other  cases  the  Supreme  Court  has  held 
that  the  absence  of  federal  legislation  is  to  be  construed  as 
evidence  of  a  purpose  on  the  part  of  the  Congress  that  there 
shall  be  no  legislation  on  the  part  of  the  States  with  respect 
to  the  subjects  concerned.  In  such  cases  the  Court  has  con- 
sequently declared  the  state  legislation  invalid.  These  cases 
have  been  most  conspicuous  in  connection  with  attempts  on 
the  part  of  the  states  to  regulate  commerce,  and  have  be- 
come more  numerous  in  recent  years.  The  general  tendency 
has  been  in  the  direction  of  an  expanding  federal,  and  a  con- 
tracting state,  power. 

Among  the  earlier  cases  of  this  sort  the  most  note- 
worthy is  that  of  Prigg  versus  Pennsylvania,  already  cited 
in  another  connection.  In  this  case  the  Supreme  Court  held, 
not  only  that  the  obligation  to  secure  the  rendition  of  fugi- 
tive slaves  lay  upon  the  federal  government,  but  also  that 
this  was  an  exclusive  obligation.  Hence  the  laws  of  the 
States,  enacted  to  aid  in  the  recovery  of  such  fugitives, 
were  all  unconstitutional.  Chief  Justice  Taney  submitted  a 
vigorous  dissent  on  this  point,  in  which  two  of  his  colleagues 
concurred.  He  contended  stoutly  that  the  States  possessed 
a  concurrent  jurisdiction  over  the  subject.  The  result  was 
to  leave  the  whole  subject  in  doubt,  and  the  doubts  have 
never  been  dispelled.  In  many  cases  the  states  have  invaded 
this  twilight  region  where  the  confusion  of  state  and  federal 
authority  has  left  the  limits  of  each  in  obscurity.    In  some 


318      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

of  these  cases  they  have  accomplished  their  purpose.  More 
often  they  have  failed.  In  other  cases  the  Congress  has 
tried  to  give  effect  to  the  legislation  of  the  several  States 
with  respect  to  subjects  over  which  their  jurisdiction  may 
be  supposed  to  be  concurrent.  Thus  by  the  Webb-Kenyon  act 
the  Congress  tried  to  enable  the  States  to  exclude  intoxicat- 
ing liquors  from  their  borders.  In  this  it  was  successful. 
But  subsequently  the  Congress  made  a  somewhat  similar 
effort  to  enable  the  States  to  extend  the  protection  of  their 
workmen's  compensation  acts  to  longshoremen  and  steve- 
dores, employed  in  unloading  vessels  engaged  in  interstate 
or  foreign  commerce,  and  failed.  When  the  Congress  came 
to  submit  the  eighteenth  amendment  to  the  States  and 
wished  to  make  sure  that  the  States  would  have  concurrent 
power  to  enforce  the  amendment,  they  explicitly  so  providec' 
in  the  amendment  itself.  In  general  the  States  do  not  re- 
ceive  the  benefit  of  the  doubt  in  cases  involving  their  implied 
concurrent  power  under  the  federal  Constitution.  They  can- 
not greatly  extend  their  range  of  activities  into  the  twilight 
region  except  upon  sufferance  by  the  federal  government. 
Within  this  vast  and  increasingly  important  field  of  opera- 
tions they  are  at  best  mere  tenants  at  will.  In  special  cases 
they  may  be  permitted  to  function  concurrently  with  the 
federal  government,  but  the  experience  with  the  use  of  con- 
current powers  by  the  States  under  the  prohibition  amend- 
ment does  not  warrant  the  expectation  that  the  Nation  will 
depend  upon  such  agents  for  more  than  casual  and  purely 
supplementary  assistance.  It  does  not  seem  likely  that  there 
will  be  much  opportunity  for  States  to  function  concurrent- 
ly with  the  federal  government  as  agents  of  the  Nation. 

The  fifth  case  in  which  the  states  may  act  as  agents  of 
the  Nation  is  that  in  which  the  federal  government  volun- 
tarily assumes  responsibilities  not  prohibited,  though  not 
expressly  conferred  upon  it,  by  the  Constitution,  and  pre- 
viously borne  by  the  States  alone.  In  this  case  the  States 
are  already  in  possession  of  the  field  and  there  can  be  no 
question  of  their  eviction  by  the  federal  government.  But 
by  the  grant  of  federal  subsidies  in  aid  of  established  or  pro- 
jected state  activities  the  States  may  become  the  agents  of 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  319 

the  Nation  in  so  far  as  the  expenditure  of  such  grants  is  con- 
cerned. To  what  extent  the  federal  government  should 
attach  conditions  to  the  grants  by  means  of  which  it  may 
acquire  an  influence  over  the  activities  of  the  States  not  con- 
templated by  the  Constitution  is  a  question  of  policy  that 
does  not  require  consideration  here.  It  suffices  to  know 
that  the  implied  powers  of  the  federal  government  are  broad 
enough  to  cover  intervention  in  almost  any  field  of  admin- 
istrative action  in  which  it  is  sufficiently  interested  to  be 
willing  to  supply  substantial  funds.  The  modem  rule  of 
constitutional  interpretation  in  such  matters  seems  to  be 
that  laid  down  by  President  John  Quincy  Adams  in  his  first 
annual  message  to  Congress.  "The  Constitution  under  which 
you  are  assembled/'  said  he,  "is  a  charter  of  limited  powers 
....  If  these  powers  may  be  effectually  brought  into  ac- 
tion by  laws  promoting  the  improvement  of  agriculture, 
commerce,  and  manufactures,  the  cultivation  and  encourage- 
ment of  the  mechanic  and  of  the  elegant  arts,  the  advance- 
ment of  literature,  and  the  progress  of  the  sciences,  orna- 
mental and  profound,  to  refrain  from  exercising  them  for 
the  benefit  of  the  people  themselves  would  be  to  hide  in  the 
earth  the  talent  committed  to  our  charge."  John  Quincy 
Adams  wished  to  use  the  "talent"  committed  to  his  charge 
for  internal  improvements,  largely  in  the  form  of  river  im- 
provements and  canals,  and  for  a  national  university  at 
Washington.  In  more  recent  times  the  use  of  the  "talent" 
has  been  demanded  for  rural  highways  and  automobile 
roads,  and  for  state  universities  and  vocational  education. 
Thus  the  Selective  Service  Act  is  not  the  only  harbinger 
of  a  new  era  in  the  constitutional  history  of  the  States.^ 
Nearly  sixty  years  ago  Congress  inaugurated  the  policy  of 
federal  grants  to  the  States  in  aid  of  education.  The  Mor- 
rill Act  of  1862  provided  for  the  establishment  of  the  state 
agricultural  and  mechanical  colleges  by  an  endowment  of 
lands  from  the  public  domain.  Subsequently,  in  1890  and 
in  1907,  Congress  passed  acts  authorizing  permanent  ap- 


iCf.,  Paul  H.  Douglas,  "The  Development  of  a  System  of  Federal 
Grants  in  Aid,"  Political  Science  Quarterly,  June  and  Dec,  1920, 


320      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Qvnrterly 

propriations  of  money  towards  the  further  development  of 
the  land-grant  colleges.  These  funds  are  administered  by 
the  Bureau  of  Education  of  the  Department  of  the  Interior. 
In  addition,  the  States  Relations  Service  of  the  Depai*tment 
of  Agriculture  administers  the  funds  provided  by  a  series  of 
acts,  beginning  in  1887,  for  the  support  of  the  agricultural 
experiment  stations  established  in  connection  with  the  land- 
grant  colleges,  and  of  the  cooperative  extension  work  in 
agriculture  and  home  economics.  Finally  the  Federal  Board 
for  Vocational  Education,  created  in  1917  on  the  eve  of 
the  War,  administers  the  funds  for  the  promotion  by  the 
States  of  vocational  education  in  agriculture,  industry,  and 
commerce,  and  for  the  training  of  teachers  of  vocational 
subjects.  By  the  acts  of  1918  and  1920  this  Board  has  also 
been  charged  with  the  allotment  of  additional  sums  for  the 
vocational  rehabilitation  of  disabled  soldiers  and  sailors 
and  of  the  victims  of  industrial  accidents  in  civil  life.  A 
similar  policy  has  been  adopted  with  respect  to  the  improve- 
ment of  rural  post  roads.  Under  the  acts  of  1912,  1916,  and 
1919,  the  Office  of  Public  Roads  in  the  Department  of  Agri- 
culture administers  the  federal  aid  authorized  for  the  im- 
provement of  such  roads.  This  now  amounts  to  one  hundred 
millions  of  dollars  a  year  and  is  expended  by  the  State  high- 
way authorities  under  federal  supervision.  The  Congress 
which  has  just  adjourned  had  before  it  three  measures  of 
a  similar  character.  One  was  to  authorize  an  additional  one 
hundred  millions  of  dollars  to  be  apportioned  among  the 
States  under  the  Rural  Post  Roads  acts;  a  second  was  to 
authorize  the  apportionment  of  an  additional  one  hundred 
millions  for  educational  purposes,  the  so-called  Smith- 
Towner  bill;  and  a  third,  the  so-called  Sheppard-Towner 
bill,  to  authorize  the  apportionment  of  a  lesser  amount  to 
assist  the  States  in  providing  for  the  public  protection  of 
maternity  and  infancy.  The  federal  aid  to  be  authorized 
by  the  first  of  these  pending  bills  would  be  administered  by 
the  Department  of  Agriculture  through  its  Office  of  Public 
Roads,  as  in  the  case  of  the  earlier  Rural  Post  Roads  acts. 
The  Federal  aid  to  be  authorized  by  the  Smith-Towner  bill 
would  be  administered  by  a  new  Department  of  Education, 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  321 

which  will  absorb  the  existing  Bureau  of  Education  in  the 
Department  of  the  Interior.  The  aid  contemplated  by  the 
Sheppard-Towner  bill  would  be  administered  by  another 
Federal  Board  representing  the  federal  education  authorities 
and  the  Public  Health  Service.  The  chief  of  the  Children's 
Bureau  in  the  Department  of  Labor  is  designated  the  ex- 
ecutive officer  of  this  Board. 

Whatever  may  be  the  ultimate  fate  of  these  measures, 
this  is  the  field  in  which  the  States  have  the  most  promising 
future.  As  electoral  agencies  the  States  have  served  the 
Nation  badly.  As  the  agency  for  recruiting  the  second  line 
of  national  defence  the  States  have  served  with  no  more 
than  indifferent  success.  As  instruments  of  national  action 
in  such  matters  as  the  rendition  of  fugitives  they  have  put 
local  interests  and  prejudices  before  the  interests  of  the  Na- 
tion as  a  whole.  As  agents  in  fields  of  administrative  ac- 
tivity where  their  constitutional  position  is  uncertain,  their 
future  is  precarious  and  their  utility  doubtful.  It  is  only  in 
those  fields  of  activity  which  they  already  occupy,  and  where 
the  federal  government  intervenes  in  the  character  of  finan- 
cial associate  and  adviser  that  they  have  any  real  opportuni- 
ty to  serve  as  agents  of  the  Nation.  In  this  field,  as  chang- 
ing economic  and  social  conditions  call  for  greater  services 
on  the  part  of  the  government  to  the  people,  the  signs  por- 
tend an  unprecedented  development  of  administrative  ac- 
tivity. 

These  considerations  lead  to  the  more  general  question: 
What  is  to  be  the  future  sphere  of  the  States  in  the  American 
political  system  ?  This  is  a  question  which  has  not  ceased  to 
engage  the  attention  of  thoughtful  Americans  from  the  time, 
one  hundred  and  thirty-four  years  ago,  when  the  federal 
Constitution  was  first  submitted  to  the  people  of  the  United 
States.  The  original  Anti-Federalists  professed  to  believe, 
many  of  them  probably  did  believe,  that  the  operation  of  the 
federal  government  would  by  degrees  prove  fatal  to  the 
State  governments.  They  feared  that  the  inevitable  ten- 
dency of  the  new  system  would  be  towards  consolidation 
into  a  single  unified  body  politic.  These  forebodings  of  the 
annihilation  of  the  States  presented  one  of  the  most  formid- 


322      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

able  obstacles  which  the  advocates  of  the  more  perfect  Union 
had  to  overcome.  Madison  devoted  one  of  his  numbers  of 
The  Federalist  exclusively  to  this  objection.  'The  more  I 
revolve  the  subject,"  he  wrote,  "the  more  fully  I  am  per- 
suaded that  the  balance  is  much  more  likely  to  be  disturbed 
by  the  preponderancy"  of  the  States  than  of  the  federal  gov- 
ernment. One  reason  for  this  conviction  is  that  suggested 
by  the  passage  which  has  already  been  quoted  from  his 
writings.  He  gives  other  reasons,  however,  besides  his  be- 
lief that  the  States  would  find  a  wide  field  of  usefulness  as 
agents  of  the  Nation.  The  weight  of  Madison's  opinion 
may  be  somewhat  diminished  in  this  instance  because  he 
wrote  as  an  advocate  rather  than  as  a  dispassionate  political 
scientist.  But  it  is  confirmed  by  the  judgment  of  disinter- 
ested critics  of  the  highest  authority.  DeTocqueville,  for 
example,  the  brilliant  French  publicist,  writing  nearly  half 
a  century  later  on  Democracy  in  America,  will  not  be  sus- 
pected of  bias  as  between  Federalists  and  Anti-Federalists. 
"I  am  strangely  mistaken,"  he  said,  "if  the  federal  govern- 
ment ...  be  not  constantly  losing  in  strength,  retiring  grad- 
ually from  public  affairs,  and  narrowing  its  circle  of  action 
...  It  may  be  predicted  that,  unless  some  extraordinary 
event  occurs,  the  government  of  the  Union  will  grow  weaker 
and  weaker  every  day." 

In  justification  of  DeTocqueville,  and  perhaps  also  of 
Madison,  it  may  be  suggested  that  an  extraordinary  event 
did  occur.  The  doctrine  of  states  rights  was  subjected  tc 
trial  by  battle  and  convicted  of  error.  The  principle  of  na- 
tional sovereignty  was  thus  firmly  established  and  the  an- 
cient fears  lest  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution  of  1787  re- 
sult in  the  eventual  annihilation  of  the  States  were  once 
more  in  order.  Bryce  in  his  great  work  on  The  American 
Commonwealth  noted  the  revival  of  those  fears  and  dis- 
cussed with  his  customary  luminosity  the  prospects  of  the 
States  in  the  restored  Union.  "It  was  generally  believed  in 
Europe,"  he  wrote,  "when  the  North  triumphed  over  seces- 
sion in  1865,  that  the  federal  system  was  virtually  at  an 
end."  Fortunately  this  belief  was  unfounded.  Bryci?  points 
this  out  and  then  proceeds  to  declare  that  "it  is  nevertheless 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  323 

impossible  to  ignore  the  growing  strength  of  the  centripetal 
and  unifying  forces.  .  .  In  the  United  States  all  the  ele- 
ments of  a  national  feeling  are  present,  race,  language; 
literature,  pride  in  past  achievements,  uniformity  of  polit- 
ical habits  and  ideas ;  and  this  national  feeling  which  unifies 
the  people  is  reenforced  by  an  immensely  strong  material 
interest  in  the  maintenance  of  a  single  government  over  the 
breadth  of  the  continent.  It  may  therefore  be  concluded 
that  while  there  is  no  present  likelihood  of  a  change  from  a 
federal  to  a  consolidated  republic,  and  while  the  existing 
legal  rights  and  functions  of  the  States  may  remain  undi- 
minished for  many  years  to  come,  the  importance  of  the 
States  will  decline  as  the  majesty  and  authority  of  the  Na- 
tional government  increases."  This  view  is  the  reverse  of 
Madison's  and  DeTocqueville's,  and  is  that  which  most  gen- 
erally prevails  to-day. 

The  writer,  who  has  stated  most  boldly  the  possibility  of 
the  extinction  of  the  States  by  absorption  into  the  central 
government,  is  the  American  political  scientist.  Burgess.  In 
his  leading  article  in  the  first  number  of  the  Political  Science 
Quarterly,  composed  at  about  the  time  that  Bryce  was  pen- 
ning the  prohecy  which  has  just  been  quoted,  he  inquired : 
"Have  we  not  completed  our  federal  era  and  attained  the 
natural  condition  of  a  real  national  system?'*  His  answer  to 
his  own  question  was  emphatic.  "The  two  natural  elements 
in  our  system  are  now  the  Community  and  the  Nation.  The 
former  is  the  point  of  real  local  self-government ;  the  latter 
that  of  general  self-government;  and  in  the  adjustment  of 
the  future  these  are  the  forces  which  will  carry  with  them 
the  determining  power.  The  Commonwealth  [State]  gov- 
ernment is  now  but  a  sort  of  middle  instance.  Too  large  for 
local  government,  too  small  for  general,  it  is  beginning  to 
be  regarded  as  a  meddlesome  intruder  in  both  spheres — the 
tool  of  the  strongest  interest,  the  oppressor  of  the  indi- 
vidual ...  In  the  twentieth  century  the  Commonwealth 
will  occupy  a  much  lower  place  in  our  political  system.  .  ," 

A  new  generation  has  come  on  the  stage  since  these  pre- 
dictions were  made  and  it  is  time  to  test  their  accuracy, 
There  is  much  to  substantiate  them.    The  influence  of  easy 


324      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

and  rapid  communication  between  all  parts  of  the  country, 
of  improved  postal,  telegraph,  and  telephone  services,  and  of 
a  popular  national  press,  of  the  creation  of  a  nation-wide 
market  for  many  kinds  of  goods,  and  of  a  better  financial 
system,  in  short,  the  whole  tendency  of  the  economic  changes 
of  recent  years  has  been  toward  the  aggrandizement  of  the 
federal  power  at  the  expense  of  the  States.  There  is  conse- 
quently an  increasing  tendency  to  invoke  federal  action  to 
deal  with  matters  which  cannot  be  adequately  handled  by 
the  States,  such  as  transportation,  commerce,  and  labor 
problems.  The  champions  of  the  farmer,  of  the  wage- 
earner,  and  even,  as  in  the  case  of  daylight  saving,  of  the 
tired  business-man,  resort  to  Congress  as  the  only  agency 
strong  and  wide-reaching  enough  to  give  effect  to  their  pro- 
posals. Many  of  them  indeed  would  be  impracticable  if 
tried  in  the  narrow  area  of  one  or  more  States.  It  is  more 
true  than  ever  that,  as  Bryce  intimated,  "State  patriotism. 
State  rivalry,  State  vanity,  are  no  doubt  still  conspicuous, 
yet  the  political  interest  felt  in  the  State  governments  is 
slighter  than  it  was  before  the  civil  war,  while  national 
patriotism  has  become  warmer  and  more  pervasive."  The 
tendency  grows  stronger  to  exalt  the  authority  of  the  na- 
tional government  and  to  expand  its  administrative  activ- 
ities at  the  expense  of  the  States.  Indeed,  the  continued 
growth  of  federal  power  and  contraction  of  the  field  in  which 
the  States  are  free  to  operate  has  been  the  outstanding 
feature  of  the  constitutional  history  of  the  United  States 
during  the  period  since  Bryce  and  Burgess  wrote.  The 
principle  of  dual  sovereignty,  long  supposed  to  be  the  foun- 
dation of  our  political  system,  has  been  practically  over- 
thrown. 

Nevertheless  the  prediction  of  Bryce  and  Burgess  cannot 
now  be  accepted  without  modification.  The  decision  to  uti- 
lize the  services  of  the  States  as  agents  of  the  Nation  in  the 
administration  of  the  Selective  Service  Act  did  not  in  itself 
open  up  an  opportunity  for  the  States  to  rehabilitate  their 
declining  fortunes.  But  it  reflected  a  consciousness  of  a 
growing  opportunity  in  another  field  for  the  States  to  regain 
what  they  have  lost  as  sovereign  Commonwealths.    Their 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  325 

function  of  national  agents  will  become  increasingly  im- 
portant as  the  nation  becomes  more  and  more  interested 
in  activities  originally  carried  on  by  the  States  alone.  It  is 
a  common  observation  that  the  State  governments  are  do- 
ing more  for  their  people  today  than  ever  before.  They 
raise  more  money,  they  employ  more  servants,  they  ac- 
complish greater  results.  They  may  be  relatively  less 
powerful  members  of  our  political  system,  but  they  are  more 
active,  and  action  is  the  substance  of  government.  This  is 
partly  the  result  of  the  increased  demand  for  governmental 
action  of  many  kinds  which  has  resulted  from  the  economic 
and  social  changes  of  recent  years,  a  demand  which  the 
federal  government  alone  has  not  been  able  to  satisfy. 
Partly  also  it  is  the  result  of  increasing  public  confidence  in 
the  administrative  capacity  of  the  States  and  recognition 
of  their  better  adaptability  to  local  needs.  The  evils  of  ex- 
cessive centralization  are  better  understood  than  a  genera- 
tion ago.  While  superior  financial  resources  of  the  federal 
government  make  its  assistance  indispensable,  the  superior 
adapability  of  the  State  governments  to  local  conditions  is 
likely  more  and  more  to  lead  the  federal  government  to  work 
through  the  agency  of  the  States,  securing  the  necessary 
degree  of  federal  control  by  the  power  of  the  purse.  Our 
dual  system  of  government  will  respond  to  the  changing 
conditions.  It  will  tend  to  approximate  a  federal  system 
of  the  German  or  Swiss  type,  in  which  the  States  will  be 
able  to  justify  their  continued  existence  as  administrative 
agents  of  the  national  government.  This  is  the  tendency 
which  Madison  and  his  associates  foresaw,  but  it  will  come 
about  in  a  manner  which  they  did  not  anticipate.  The  fed- 
erated states  will  not  give  way  before  a  single  consolidated 
and  highly  centralized  State,  as  many  statesmen  and  political 
scientists  have  apprehended.  They  will  continue  to  play  a 
large,  even  an  increasing,  part  in  the  administration  of 
public  affairs,  but  as  instruments  of  national  purposes 
rather  than  as  independent  political  entities.  The  problem 
of  administrative  areas  in  the  United  States  will  not  be 
solved  by  such  a  conversion  of  the  sovereign  States.  Doubt- 
less there  will  be  fields  of  administrative  action,  such  as  per- 


326      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

haps  railroad  transportation  and  social  insurance,  in  which 
new  adminstrative  areas  for  national  purposes  will  be  de- 
vised upon  an  economic  or  industrial  rather  than  territorial 
foundation.  The  administration  of  public  affairs  will  grow 
more  rather  than  less  complicated  with  the  development  of 
the  functions  of  government.  But  the  place  of  the  State  in 
the  government  of  the  nation  seems  to  be  secure. 

If  the  States  are  to  make  the  most  of  the  promise  of  the 
'future  they  should  adapt  themselves  to  function  as  admin- 
istrative rather  than  political  areas.  The  Congressional 
Joint  Resolution  of  March  1,  1845,  under  which  Texas  en- 
tered the  Union,  provided  that  new  States  in  addition  tc 
Texas  herself,  not  to  exceed  four  in  number,  might  be 
created  out  of  the  Texan  domain. — a  vision  of  expansion 
unparalelled  in  the  history  of  the  States.  To  what  extent  this 
right  has  been  affected  by  the  subsequent  surrender  by  Texas- 
of  her  claims  to  territory  now  included  within  the  borders 
of  New  Mexico,  Colorado,  Kansas,  and  Oklahoma,  it  is  not 
necessary  to  inquire  now.  Whether  such  a  right,  indeed 
secured  only  by  a  special  reservation  in  the  enabling  act 
under  which  the  State  was  admitted  to  the  Union,  would  be 
enforceable,  is  another  question  which  need  not  now  detain 
us.  The  significance  of  this  reservation  lies  in  the  sug- 
gestion that  the  existing  boundaries  of  the  States  need  not 
necessarily  be  regarded  as  permanent.  How  much  better 
adapted  to  service  as  administrative  agents  of  the  Nation^ 
the  States  might  become,  if  they  or  some  of  them  were  re- 
organized with  a  view  to  administrative  instead  of  political 
conditions.  California,  for  example,  might  well  be  divided 
into  two  States,  and  if  Nevada  were  attached  to  the  Northern 
part,  and  Arizona  to  the  Southern,  how  much  more  service- 
able as  agents  of  the  Nation  such  States  would  be,  and  how 
much  more  service  their  people  could  obtain  with  the  taxes 
they  pay.  New  Mexico  might  be  strengthened  to  the  great 
advantage  of  its  people,  if  Western  Texas,  or  at  least  that 
part  of  it  lying  in  the  upper  Rio  Grande  valley,  were  joined 
to  New  Mexico.  Nor  would  Texas  be  injured  by  the  opera- 
tion. But  these  are  academic  suggestions !  The  States  will 
probably  remain  primarily  political  areas  for  a  long  time  tc 


The  States  as  Agents  of  the  Nation  327 

come.  Those  which  happen  to  be  best  adapted  for  the  efficient 
performance  of  their  growing  functions  as  national  admin- 
istrative areas,  however,  will  profit  most  by  the  tendencies  of 
the  future,  for  the  future  of  the  States  lies,  not  in  politics; 
but  in  administration. 


TRAINING  FOR  SOCIAL  SERVICE  IN  THE  SOUTH^ 

E.  B.  REUTER 
Tulane  University  of  Louisiana 

Social  service  is  a  generic  term  for  a  series  of  related 
activities  within  the  general  field  of  public  welfare.  It 
is  not  at  the  present  time  to  be  brought  within  the  rigid 
boundaries  of  formal  definition.  It  is  a  profession  in 
the  making,  and  as  such,  is  slowly  freeing  itself  from  par- 
tial notions  of  scope  and  function  and  taking  shape  in 
response  to  social  need  and  in  accordance  with  the  find- 
ings of  scientific  investigation.  Its  unity  lies  not  so  much 
in  a  unique  subject  matter  or  in  a  similarity  of  work  per- 
formed as  in  the  fact  that  the  service  rendered  requires 
the  attention  of  persons  of  proper  professional  training. 

The  essential  task  of  social  work  is  to  provide  profes- 
sional service  in  time  of  need  or  in  time  to  prevent  the 
emergence  of  acute  need.  It  is  not  the  giving  of  external 
help ;  it  is  the  rendering  of  a  professional  service.  The 
essential  technique  consists  in  helping  the  individual  or 
family  to  so  analyze  and  define  a  problem  situation  that 
an  individually  and  socially  tolerable  adjustment  may  be 
made,  and  in  assisting  the  community  to  see  its  own  hu- 
man and  social  needs  and  in  directing  the  mobilization  of 
the  cognmunity  resources  toward  meeting  them. 

The  function  of  the  social  worker  is  comparable  with 
that  of  the  physician.  The  physician  may  be  engaged 
in  the  treatment  of  individual  maladies  or  in  public 
health  and  preventive  medicine.  But  in  either  case  he  is 
making  an  application  to  a  particular  situation  of  a  body 
of  scientific  knowledge  which  is  his  distinctive  stock  in 
trade.  So  the  social  worker  may  be  concerned  with  in- 
dividual problems  of  maladjustment  or  with  problems  of 
community  organization  or  with  any  problem  between  the 
two  extremes  but  in  any  case  he  is  furnishing  a  profes- 
sional service;  he  is  bringing  to  bear  cyn  the  particular 
problem  in  hand  his  body  of  social  science  information. 


1  Paper   presented   at  the    Second   Annual   Meeting   of  the    South- 
western Political  Science  Association,  March  26,  1921. 


Training  for  Social  Service  in  the  South  329 

The  antecedents  of  modern  social  service  were  the. 
earlier  systems  of  remedial  charity  and  the  profession  is 
still  in  large  measure  dominated  by  conceptions  derived 
from  the  earlier  practice.  This  earlier  practice  v^as 
charity  in  relief  of  suffering  and  as  such  its  attentioln  was 
of  necessity  upon  the  handicapped  and  the  miserable. 
The  service  performed  frequently  ranged  over  the  whole 
series  of  disorders  resulting  from  individual  variation  and 
social  neglect  but  the  motive  was  frankly  the  ameliora- 
tion of  the  condition  of  the  podr. 

As  this  philanthropic  work  grew  out  of  the  ecclesias- 
tical and  sentimental  stages  and  began  to  be  put  upon  a 
semi-scientific  basis,  more  attention  came  to  be  directed 
toward  the  conditions  operating  to  produce  the  derelicts 
whose  care  earlier  was  the  chief  or  only  concern..  Various 
causal  factors — housing;  standards  of  living,  recreational 
opportunities,  legislation,  and  the  like — came  within  the 
social  worker's  field  of  interest,  and  more  energy  was  ex- 
pended in  the  efforts  to  modify  social  conditions  produc- 
tive of  unfortunate  individual  and  family  situations. 
There  was  thus  a  gradual  shifting  of  the  attention  from 
the  disadvantaged  to  the  causal  factors,  and  an  increase 
in  preventive  effort.  The  field  of  relief,  without  becom- 
ing intrinsically  less  important,  came  to  be  but  a  single 
phase  of  social  service. 

The  broadening  conception  of  the  social  service  task 
has,  inevitably,  been  accompanied  by  some  loss  of  definite- 
ness.  So  long  as  the  social  worker's  philosophy  accepted 
the  existing  social  arrangement  and  his  activities  were 
confined  to  mediating  adjustment  to  it,  the  field  of  work 
was  as  definite  as  it  was  limited.  But,  as  the  activities 
came  to  be  in  part  preventive  in  character,  the  social 
worker  came  into  contact  with  a  new  order  of  problems 
and  in  facing  them  developed  a  professional  service,  still 
inchoate,  which  requires  new  methods  of  procedure. 

There  is  no  general  agreement  in  the  camp  of  the  so- 
cial workers  as  to  the  relation  or  relative  importance  of 
the  different  phases  of  the  work.  It  is  even  too  much  to 
assume  that  the  generality  are  aware  of  the  changing 


330      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

functions  of  the  service.  It  is  frequently  identified,  even 
in  the  minds  of  the  social  workers  themselves,  with  the 
remedial  ministrations  of  the  family  case  worker;  that  is, 
with  the  essentially  human  task  of  assisting  more  or  less 
capable  people  to  fit  themselves  into  a  crude  and  imperfectly 
working  social  machine  to  the  best  interests  of  themselves, 
their  dependents,  and  society  at  large.  This  is  the  type 
of  work  that  was  first  developed;  its  method  is  best 
worked  out,  and  the  number  of  workers  manipulating  its 
technique  is  larger  than  in  any  other  phase  of  social  work. 
Consequently,  the  whole  profession  tends  to  be  dominated 
by  this  group  of  workers  and  by  the  standards  of  work 
appropriate  to  this  segment  of  the  field. 

The  first  problem  facing  those  who  undertake  the  task 
of  training  others  for  the  field  of  social  service  is  an  eval- 
uation of  the  different  phases  (>f  the  social  wojrker's  task 
and  an  attempt  to  place  the  different  types  of  social  ser- 
vice performed  in  some  sort  of  fair  relation  to  each  other 
in  the  teaching  program.  In  this  task  of  evaluation,  due 
account  must  be  taken  of  the  peculiar  situation  in  which 
the  worker  is  to  function,  and  the  proper  degree  of  em- 
phasis placed  upon  the  types  of  service  most  valuable  and 
forward-looking  in  the  situation.  The  training  given 
should  be  of  a  type  adapted  to  the  needs  of  the  communi- 
ty to  be  served. 

Social  work  in  this  country  had  its  first  development 
in  the  larger  cities  of  the  North  and  East.  It  developed 
in  response  to  the  needs  of  the  local  situation  and  evolved 
a  highly  specialized  technique  admirably  adapted  to  the 
problems  to  be  met.  The  assumption  is  current  in  ortho- 
dox social  circles  that  this  technique  is  of  universal  valid- 
ity and  capable  of  universal  application,  and  there  is  a 
consequent  tendency  to  carry  it  over  and  impose  it  on 
other  situations.  This  Procrustean  procedure  is  not  al- 
ways productive  of  happy  results.  It  is  necessary  to  rec- 
ognize that  family  case  work  does  not  cover  the  whole 
field  of  social  service  and,  so  far  as  rural  and  semi-rural 
conditions  exist,  is  neither  the  center  nor  the  most  im- 
portant part  of  the  field. 


Training  for  Social  Service  in  the  South         331 

So,  without  in  any  way  raising  the  question  as  to  the  legit- 
imacy of  other  methods  of  procedure  in  other  situations, 
we  may  recognize  that  the  South  has  some  special  prob- 
lems and,  so  far  as  this  is  the  case,  may  have  need  for 
distinctive  methods  and  adaption  of  methods  in  dealing 
with  them.  The  training  program  must  recognize  the  dis- 
tinctive needs  and  give  the  student  in  training  the  equip- 
ment for  dealing  with  them. 

The  South  is  essentially  rural.  The  problems  that  con- 
front the  social  workers  are  those  of  farm,  village,  and 
town  life. 

That  there  is  maladjustment  in  these  conditions  that 
makes  a  place  for  the  ministrations  of  the  remedial 
worker  every  reasonable  and  informed  person  admits. 
The  recent  publication  of  the  army  statistics  relative  to 
the  physical  and  mental  condition  of  the  army  recruits 
showed  about  twenty  per  cent  of  the  drafted  men  to  be 
unfit  for  service  and  half  the  remainder  were  accepted 
in  spite  of  obvious  defects.  Probably  three-fifths  of  the 
adult  male  population  are  defectives  or,  including  the 
women  where  the  per  cent  of  defect  is  still  higher,  three- 
fourths  of  the  adult  population  are  suffering  from  some 
form  of  handicap.  On  the  mental  side  the  examinations 
showed  about  seventy  per  cent  of  the  recruits  to  have  a 
level  of  intelligence  inferior  to  the  normal  boy  of  fifteen 
years.  That  there  is  a  place  and  a  need  for  every  type  of 
social  service  in  a  population  with  approximately  seventy- 
five  per  cent  of  its  adult  members  handicapped  and  nearly 
the  same  per  cent  of  its  members  having  an  intelligence 
level  of  adolescent  children  is  too  obvious  to  require  elab- 
oration. The  need  in  the  South  is  not  less  than  in  the 
country  at  large.  Indeed,  so  far  as  a  difference  exists,  the 
South  makes  the  poorer  showing :  the  per  cent  of  defect 
is  somewhat  higher;  the  level  of  intelligence  is  somewhat 
lower. 

There  is  thus  no  intenticJn  to  minimize  the  importance 
of  work  to  be  done  with  the  disadvantaged  groups.  Our 
institutions  are  admittedly  inadequate  and  not  always 
models  of  their  kind ;  our  legislative  neglect  is  somewhat 


332      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

notorious;  our  penal  system  is  odious.  Almost  no'thing 
has  been  done  and  it  is  practically  impossible  to  exag- 
gerate the  pitiable  condition  that  has  resulted  from  social 
neglect  and  toleration  of  conditions  that  degrade.  But 
it  is  equally  necessary  to.  recognize  that  poverty  with  its 
accompaniments  presents  a  different  problem  in  different 
settings.  The  problem  and  the  procedure  in  the  open 
country  with  its  primary,  personal,  type  of  social  life  are 
things  quite  apart  from  the  problem  and  the  procedure 
in  the  urban  situation  with  its  secondary,  impersonal,  type 
of  human  relations.  Moreover,  and  apart  from  the  dif- 
ferences of  procedure,  the  problems  of  the  disadvantaged 
and  the  handicapped,  however  important  they  may  be^ 
are  not  the  chief  problems  confronting  social  service  in 
the  South. 

The  outstanding  problems  which,  if  not  peculiar  to  the 
South  are  to  be  found  here  in  peculiar  form,  are  problems 
of  a  community  sort.  The  South  is  confronted  by  a  con- 
dition of  rural  isolation  the  effects  of  which  must  be  neu- 
tralized if  the  section  is  not  permanently  to  remain  the 
laggard  in  American  culture.  It  is  unique  in  its  posses- 
sion of  a  race  situation  in  which  some  steps  in  the  direc- 
tion of  improvement  must  presently  be  made.  The  lack 
of  public  appreciation  of  the  local  social  needs  is  almost 
complete. 

These  and  numerous  other  characteristics  of  the 
Southern  situation  present  problems  of  community  organ- 
ization and  social  education.  The  reliance  on  the  com- 
mon sense  and  popular  interest  in  dealing  with  them  has 
not  only  failed,  it  has  resulted  in  social  conditions  that 
have  made  certain  sections  of  the  South,  at  least,  a  na- 
tional byword.  To  the  solution  of  such  community  prob- 
lems the  social  worker  must  make  his  contribution  or  fail 
to  justify  his  existence  in  the  situation.  But  a  technique 
for  the  solution  of  such  problems  and  for  dealing  with 
such  situations  is  yet  to  be  developed;  a  procedure 
adapted  to  the  problems  and  conditions  must  grow.  It 
is  not  a  thing  that  exists  elsewhere  which  may  be  taken 
over  ready-made  and  applied  to  the  Southern  field.  Work 


Training  for  Social  Service  in  the  South  333 

is  being  done,  experiments  are  being  tried,  experience  is  be- 
ing recorded,  and  methods  of  work  are  being  shaped  and 
perfected  but  no  technique  now  exists  in  any  fully  devel- 
oped form. 

If  this  characterization  of  the  Southern  situation  be 
in  accord  with  the  facts,  the  function  of  social  ser- 
vice is  in  part  a  professional  attention  to  the  needs  of 
the  handicapped  and  the  maladjusted  and  in  part  a  com- 
munity service.  On  the  part  of  the  person  who  under- 
takes to  mediate  in  the  adjustment  of  personal  and  family 
problems  there  is  needed  the  training  and  capacity  to 
understand  the  mental  and  temperamental  nature  of  the 
person  in  distress  as  well  as  an  understanding  of  the  so- 
cial organization  into  which  adjustment  is  to  be  made  to- 
gether with  a  certain  amount  of  tact,  a  certain  maturity 
of  judgment,  and  a  freedom  from  race  and  creedal  pre- 
judice. When  the  task  essayed  is  one  of  community  or- 
ganization or  any  problem  involving  group  direction  the 
professional  person  needs  an  understanding  of  the  nature 
of  social  progress  as  well  as  some  knowledge  of  the  so- 
cial forces  and  their  operation  in  order  to  appreciate  com- 
munity and  group  needs  and  to  direct  the  gro'up  forces 
and  community  resources  to  the  end  of  social  advance. 
So,  whatever  it  may  be  elsewhere,  the  training  needed  by 
the  social  worker  in  the  South  in  the  present  stage  of  de- 
velopment is  not  so  much  technical  and  vocational  as  it  is 
educational.  What  is  most  needed  is  ability  to  see  the 
community  problems  and  to  see  them  in  relation  to  the 
whole  social  situation,  plus  an  acquaintance  with  such 
methods  of  work  as  have  proved  valuable  elsewhere. 

The  function  of  social  service  in  the  South  is  to  provide 
a  community  leadership.  Every  community  is  suffering 
from  its  lack.  This  is  inevitable  perhaps  in  view  of  the 
conception  of  higher  education  that  has  been  so  long  dom- 
inant in  the  South,  but  it  sets  a  task  for  social  service 
teaching  and  that  task  is  largely  one  of  producing  per- 
sons capable  of  leadership  and  community  direction.  The 
type  of  social  worker  that  we  here  need  is  the  person  with 
the  ability  to  define  the  community  needs,  point  out  the  com- 


334      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

munity  resources,  and  rationalize  and  direct  community 
efforts  at  social  betterment  in  a  way  to  avoid  mistakes, 
waste,  and  misdirected  growth. 

An  adequate  training  for  this  type  of  social  service  de- 
mands, in  addition  to  the  general  training  that  forms  the 
background  of  modern  culture,  a  certain  minimum  of 
knowledge  of  the  body  of  fundamental  science  on  which 
the  profession  of  social  work  rests:  s(}me  knowledge  of 
the  human  animal  on  both  the  physical  and  the  mental 
side ;  some  knowledge  of  sanitation  and  public  health ; 
some  knowledge  of  modern  industrial  society  and  eco- 
nomic institutions;  so[me  knowledge  of  political  institu- 
tions and  their  functioning;  some  knowledge  of  social 
organization  and  social  forces;  such  knowledge,  in  other 
words,  as  forms  the  essence  of  any  education  accurately 
termed  cultural.  In  addition  to  it,  the  professional  social 
worker  must  needs  acquire  a  fund  of  more  specialized  social 
knowledge  on  which  more  directly  to  base  a  technique. 
A  knowledge  of  race,  immigration,  labor,  poverty,  defec- 
tiveness, delinquency,  child  care,  and  other  social  prob- 
lems of  the  population  is  essential.  Finally,  there  is  a 
certain  amount  of  strictly  social  work  technique  to  be 
mastered. 

Stating  this  in  terms  of  university  training:  a  college 
education  is  an  essential  minimum  basis  for  professional 
social  service.  But  graduation  from  college  is  not  essen- 
tial. Nor  is  a  cdllege  degree  any  evidence  of  educational 
fitness:  there  are  all  sorts  of  college  degrees.  But  if  the 
student  devotes  the  earlier  years  of  a  college  course  to 
history,  literature,  and  the  physical  and  biological 
sciences;  the  middle  years  to  acquiring  an  elementary 
acquaintance  with  the  fundamental  social  sciences  of 
psychology,  sociology,  economics,  political  science,  and 
the  like;  and  in  the  latter  years  of  his  course  gives  his 
chief  attention  to  the  field  of  pre-professional  study  in 
such  problems  and  conditions  as  are  conventionally  in- 
cluded in  the  undergraduate  courses  in  sqcial  technology, 
he  should  by  the  time  of  graduation  be  reasonably  pre- 


Training  for  Social  Service  in  the  South         335 

pared,  academically,  for  the  simpler  types  of  social  ser- 
vice and  leadership. 

In  addition  to  this  a  year  may  profitably  be  spent  in 
vocational  work  and  practice  training.  It  is,  however, 
quite  usual  to  over  emphasize  this  phase  of  the  teaching 
because  professiofnal  training  is  so  often  given  to  inade- 
quately prepared  students.  Without  a  knowledge  of  the 
principles  and  facts  of  human  behavior  and  social  organ- 
ization the  technical  training  presents  peculiar  difficul- 
ties and  its  acquisition  is  necessarily  imperfect  and  some- 
what mechanical.  But  the  socially  trained  person  will 
acquire  a  social  work  technique  with  ease  and  rapidity. 
It  is  entirely  feasible  and  in  accord  with  some  good 
modern  practice  to  include  the  strictly  technical  training 
as  a  part  of  the  senior  year  in  connection  with  the  pre- 
professional  work.  It  is  after  all  learning  a  technique 
and  this  is  chiefly  a  matter  of  the  student  acquiring  skill 
in  the  manipulation  of  a  tool  and  acquiring  a  confidence 
in  his  ability  to  manipulate  the  tool  with  skill. 

It  seems  fair  to  assume  that  a  minimum  adequate  train- 
ing for  social  service  is  that  represented  by  a  c6llege 
course  placing  the  chief  emphasis  on  the  social  sciences 
plus  a  year  of  vocational  study  and  practice. 

I  recognize  also  that  the  minimum  here  outlined  is 
somewhat  in  excess  of  the  amount  of  training  now  usually 
required  of  persons  entering  social  service  work.  In- 
cidentally, here  lies  one  reason  for  the  low  status  of  so 
much  of  the  present  day  work.  Also  I  recognize  that 
there  are  certain  difficulties  in  the  way  of  insisting  upon 
an  adequate  training  and  that  there  are  some  special  dif- 
ficulties to  its  attainment  in  the  South. 

The  South  is  essentially  rural  with  all  the  advantages 
and  disadvantages  that  go  with  that  status.  As  a  result 
of  it  we  are  in  special  need  of  social  service.  But  with  it, 
perhaps  as  a  result  of  it,  we  possess  a  certain  insularity 
of  mind  that  makes  us  particularly  sensitive  to  our  short- 
comings and  resentful  of  attention  being  directed  toward 
them.  We  are  still  in  the  psychological  stage  of  juvenility 
where  we  are  avid  of  flattery  and  reference  to  our  re- 


336      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

medial  deficiences  is  more  apt  to  get  an  emotional  than  an 
intellectual  reaction.  We  are  more  prone  to  apologize 
for  our  faults,  explain,  minimize,  and  conceal  them  than 
to  frankly  face  the  unpleasant  and  profit  by  criticism. 
This  attitude  of  mind  is  an  outstanding  obstacle  to  social 
service  and  social  service  training  which  of  necessity  rec- 
ognize the  existence  ctf  the  imperfections  they  are  con- 
cerned to  remove. 

The  low  status  of  so  much  of  the  social  work  that  is 
now  being  done  is  another  obstacle  to  social  service  train- 
ing. The  idea  is  general  that  social  work  is  a  glorified 
sort  of  slumming  and  an  objective  attitude  toward  much 
that  is  actually  being  done  gives  not  a  little  justification 
for  the  impression.  To  the  ranks  of  the  social  workers 
there  have  been  attracted  not  a  few  worthy  men  of  God 
whose  success  in  the  ministry  was  not  such  as  to  warrant 
their  continuance  in  that  field  of  endeavor.  Many 
teachers  past  their  period  of  usefulness  in  the  instruction 
of  the  youth  have  found  social  work  somewhat  less  exact- 
ing. Many  socially  prominent  and  worthy  women  with 
a  sentimental  turn  and  slender  income  have  been  able  to 
engage  in  the  work  without  undue  loss  of  caste.  There 
would  seem  to  be  a  widely  prevalent  idea  that  failure  in 
another  field  of  endeavor  is  evidence  of  competence  to 
enter  social  work.  No  other  professional  field  includes 
so  high  a  percentage  of  persons  whcjse  failure  in  a  former 
work  is  their  chief  preparation  for  their  present  occupa- 
tion. 

The  fact  that  so  many  who  are  doing  social  work  are 
untrained  reflects  itself  in  an  indisposition  on  the  part  of 
others  to  undergo  a  serious  period  of  preparation.  They 
do  not  feel  it  necessary  to  understand  the  social  order; 
they  desire  only  a  technique  for  reforming  it.  This  at- 
titude has  been  fostered  the  country  over  by  certain 
schools,  hard  put  to  it  for  students,  which  undertake  to 
produce  trained  so.cial  workers  in  periods  varying  with 
the  'financial  straits  of  the  school.  It  is  consequently  dif- 
ficult for  students  to  understand  why  they  should  be  re- 
quired to  study  psychology,  sociology,  economics,  and  the 


Training  for  Social  Service  in  the  South         337 

like  when  other  schools  will  give  them  a  beautifully  em- 
bellished certificate  of  incompetency  without  such  pre- 
liminaries. This  attitude  has  been  further  stimulated  in 
recent  years  by  the  various  "short  courses"  inaugurated 
as  a  necessary  war  measure.  It  is  in  part  due  to  these 
palpable  absurdities  that  a  reaction  has  set  in ;  we  prob- 
ably have  seen  the  worst  stage  that  this  generation  will 
see  in  the  process  of  wet-nursing  social  reformers. 

Another  very  real  difficulty  in  the  way  of  training  for 
social  service  in  the  South  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  colleges 
have  somewhat  neglected  the  sc>cial  sciences.  It  is  pos- 
sible for  the  student  to  go  through  some  of  our  liberal  arts 
colleges  and  graduate  as  unbesmirched  by  a  knowledge 
of  contemporary  civilization  as  he  is  by  any  gross  knowl- 
edge of  utilitarian  possibility.  Not  d|nly  is  it  possible ;  in 
a  goodly  share  of  our  institutions  it  is  inevitable.  In  many 
colleges  there  is  no  opportunity  provided  for  the  student 
to  get  the  sort  of  general  and  pre-professional  informa- 
tion that  will  serve  as  a  background  for  social  service 
training.  Consequently,  it  is  necessary  in  the  training 
for  social  service  to  provide  training  also  in  the  funda- 
mental social  sciences  and  in  pre-vocational  work  as  well 
as  the  training  in  social  service  technique. 

To  insist  upon  an  adequate  training  is  more  difficult  in 
the  South  than  in  some  other  sections  of  the  country  be- 
cause of  the  absence  of  a  supporting  body  of  opinion. 
The  absence  of  the  social  sciences  from  the  curriculum  of 
the  colleges  has  left  the  community  practically  devoid  of 
socially-minded  people.  Consequently,  there  is  little  ap- 
preciation of  the  importance  of  the  human  sciences  as  a 
preparation  for  social  work,  and  little  appreciation  of  the 
need  of  social  service  itself.  Even  among  the  social 
workers  themselves  social  training  is  so  uncommon  that 
there  is  a  naive  unconsciousness  of  its  absence. 

Social  service,  in  the  conception  of  this  paper,  is  a  pro- 
fessional service.  As  such  it  can  be  performed  only  by 
persons  of  special  training.  The  special  type  of  service 
needed  varies  with  the  social  situation  and  the  training 
program  should   be   adapted  to  the   local   needs.     The 


338      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Qvxirterly 

special  need  of  the  Southern  sections  is  not  so  much  iok 
remedial  charity,  though  that  is  not  to  be  minimized, 
as  it  is  for  a  socially  trained  leadership.  The  work  of 
training  for  social  service  is  the  task  of  training  a  local 
leadership  that  may  presently  awaken  communities  to 
the  consequences  of  existing  social  conditions,  formulate 
plans  for  social  welfare,  and  direct  community  efforts  to- 
ward social  betterment.  The  type  of  training  needed  by 
the  person  who  would  essay  this  task  is  a  socialized  edu- 
cation that  will  give  him  a  vision  of  social  efficiency,  a 
working  technique,  and  a  body  of  specific  information 
that  he  may  bring  to  bear  upon  the  concrete  problems  of 
his  task.  The  difficulties  to  be  overcome  in  the  develop- 
ment of  training  for  social  service  leadership  lie  in  the 
present  low  status  of  the  profession  itself  and  in  the  sig- 
nal failure  of  the  colleges  to  produce  either  a  body  of 
public  opinion  favorable  to  social  investigation  and  im- 
provement or  a  body  of  graduates  with  a  type  of  educa- 
tion that  would  serve  as  a  basis  for  professional  social  ser- 
vice training. 


A  REVIEW  OF  THE  MINIMUM  WAGE  THEORY  AND 

PRACTICE,  WITH  SPECIAL  REFERENCE 

TO  TEXAS 

W.    M.    W.    SPLAWN 

University  of  Texas 

Before  describing  the  minimum  wage  law  of  Texas  and 
the  efforts  to  put  it  in  force,  it  will  be  well  to  review  the 
theory  of  the  minimum  wage  and  give  a  short  account  of 
how  it  has  operated  in  other  states. 

I 

Our  industrial  society  is  founded  upon  private  property 
and  freedom  of  enterprise.  Society  relies  largely  upon  com- 
petition to  regulate  industry  in  the  interest  of  all.  With 
people  free  to  enter  or  to  refrain  from  entering  into  con- 
tractual relations,  it  is  assumed  that  the  supply  of  things 
and  of  services  will  be  readily  adjusted  to  the  demand.  Our 
industries  are  organized  by  self  appointed  directors.  We 
say  let  any  man  manage  an  enterprise  who  has  the  initia- 
tive to  get  together  the  needed  factors  of  production.  We 
assume  that  if  qualified  for  the  responsible  task  he  volun- 
tarily chooses  he  will  survive,  if  not  he  will  be  eliminated 
by  competition  with  those  who  are  better  fitted. 

The  expenses  of  producing  goods  must  be  incurred  be- 
fore the  goods  are  brought  to  the  market.  It  takes  timci 
to  bring  goods  into  existence.  The  outlay  necessary  to 
create  the  goods  has  been  made  by  the  time  they  are  on  the 
market.  Whether  or  not  they  will  sell  for  enough  to  meet 
the  cost  of  production,  depends  upon  the  circumstances  af- 
fecting the  market  at  the  time  they  are  offered  for  sale. 
The  organizer  of  a  productive  process  must  forecast  the 
future ;  he  must  estimate  the  future  demand  for  his  product ; 
he  must  guess  as  best  he  may  what  it  will  bring  on  th^ 
market  when  he  is  ready  to  sell.  If  his  judgment  is  in-; 
correct  he  may  find  that  his  goods  bring  in  the  market  less 


340      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

than  it  cost  him  to  make  them.  In  such  a  case,  having 
failed  to  supply  society  with  the  goods  most  wanted,  he 
would  be  eliminated,  if  competition  always  brought  the  com- 
monly assumed  results.  But  an  organizer  in  such  a  predic- 
ament might  reason  that  he  had  capital  invested  in  his  plant 
in  highly  specialized  form,  and  that  his  machinery  would 
have  to  be  scrapped  and  would  be  almost  a  total  loss  if  he 
should  quit  his  business.  Rather  than  face  so  great  a  loss 
he  might  elect  to  continue  with  the  hope  of  a  better  market 
for  his  goods.  In  such  a  case  he  would  certainly  try  to 
reduce  the  expenses  of  production.  It  might  be  very  diffi- 
cult appreciably  to  decrease  the  charges  against  his  busi- 
ness in  the  way  of  rents,  interest,  taxes  or  insurance.  In 
this  strait  he  would  likely  try  to  reduce  wages.  If  competi- 
tion worked  perfectly  in  all  cases,  he  could  not  lower  the 
wages  of  his  employees,  for  if  he  did  they  would  accept 
wages  at  the  current  rate  from  those  employers  who  had 
been  more  successful  in  forecasting  what  society  would 
want,  and  who  were  getting  a  price  for  their  goods  equal 
to  or  in  excess  of  the  expenses  of  production;  when  the 
failing  employer  asked  his  laborers  to  take  less  than  the 
current  rate  they  would  leave  him  and  go  elsewhere.  But 
ignorance  of  the  facts,  immobility,  or  other  causes,  often 
keep  laborers  from  going  elsewhere  and  causes  them  to  sub- 
mit to  a  reduction  of  wages,  and  this  may  enable  the  failing 
employer  to  reduce  expenses  and  continue  the  business.  In 
that  event  society  would  be  getting  a  satisfaction  for  less 
than  its  legitimate  costs,  and  would  be  using  it  in  prefer- 
ence to  other  things  only  because  it  was  brought  to  the 
consumer  for  less  than  such  cost.  A  business  not  justified 
by  social  demand  would  continue  to  exist  because  subsidized 
through  an  enforced  reduction  of  wages  below  the  current 
rate.  Society  deserves  no  satisfactions  the  expenses  of  pro- 
ducing which  it  is  unwilling  to  pay.  It  is  assumed  that 
under  free  competition,  only  such  goods  will  continue  to  be 
brought  to  the  market  as  will  bring  from  those  who  want 
them  enough  to  cover  at  the  least  the  expenses  of  produc-. 
tion.  If  organizers  can  beat  down  wages  below  the  current 
rate,  they  will  continue  in,  or  even  enter  profitably  upon  a 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  341 

business  which  would  fail  if  it  had  to  pay  for  all  of  the  fac- 
tors of  production  at  the  current  rates. 

Women  and  children  are  more  apt  to  be  exploited  by  such 
employers  than  any  others.  They  constitute  the  least  mo- 
bile portion  of  the  labor  supply.  They  must  often  work 
near  home,  and  are  limited  to  those  opportunities  for  em- 
ployment which  are  afforded  by  the  community  in  which 
they  reside.  Advantage  is  frequently  taken  of  the  fact  that 
they  may  be  able  to  get  a  part  of  their  support  from  other 
members  of  the  family.  Many  employers  of  women  prefer 
those  who  live  with  parents  or  husbands  who  contribute  to 
their  support.  Again  a  woman  worker  is  presumed  to  have 
none  but  herself  to  support,  whereas  a  man  is  likely  to  have 
a  family  dependent  upon  him.  For  that  reason  the  wants 
of  a  woman  in  industry  are  assumed  to  be  less  than  those 
of  a  man.  Her  needs  are  supposed  to  be  for  one,  herself; 
a  man's  needs  are  supposed  to  include  those  of  others  along 
with  his  own.  Then,  too,  the  unskilled  women  workers  are 
not  as  a  rule  organized  and  find  it  very  difficult  to  organize. 
When  they  do  organize  they  rarely  find  themselves  able  to 
bargain  to  better  advantage,  for  if  they  walk  out,  there  are 
other  women  ready  to  replace  them  out  of  ignorance  of  the 
facts,  or  thoughtlessness,  or  from  necessity.  The  women 
are  the  least  able  to  bargain  with  powerful  corporate  or- 
ganizations, or  with  resourceful  employers. 

With  power  machinery,  women  may  be  as  useful  in  a 
given  industry  as  men.  Since  they  can  be  had  for  less 
wages  it  may  be  more  profitable  to  employ  them,  or  by 
using  them  instead  of  men,  one  employer  may  underbid 
another  in  the  market.  This  often  results  in  compelling 
all  in  such  an  industry  to  employ  women,  and  wages  are 
beaten  lower  and  lower,  until  the  whole  industry  may  be- 
come sweated.  Using  women  at  the  low  wages  fixed  as  the 
result  of  their  lack  of  bargaining  power,  does  not  merely 
result  in  a  poor  standard  of  living  for  themselves,  but  it 
tends  to  drive  men  out  of  employment,  or  to  lower  their 
wages.  The  result  of  that  kind  of  a  process  would  be  to 
reduce  whole  sections  of  the  population  to  the  direst  pov- 
erty, to  reduce  the  level  of  subsistence  for  all  in  such  indus- 


342      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

tries  to  the  lowest  to  which  the  recent  immigrant  from  the 
most  impoverished  land  had  been  accustomed.  To  prevent 
these  consequences  as  well  as  to  protect  the  well  being  of 
women  and  children,  some  states  have  thought  it  necessary 
to  enact  minimum  wage  laws. 

II. 

Minimum  wage  legislation  originated  and  has  had  its  de- 
velopment among  English  speaking  people.  The  first  min- 
imum wage  law  was  tried  in  the  British  possessions  of  the 
Pacific  about  a  quarter  century  ago.  In  1894  the  District 
Conciliation  Boards  of  New  Zealand,  established  for  the 
compulsory  arbitration  of  labor  disputes,  were  given  the 
authority  to  fix  minimum  wages.  In  1896,  in  the  State  of 
Victoria  in  Australia,  the  first  independent  agencies  for  fix- 
ing minimum  wages  were  created.  These  Special  Boards, 
as  they  were  called  in  Australia,  were  made  up  of  an  equal 
number  of  employers  and  of  employees,  who  in  turn  chose 
a  chairman  from  the  outside,  who  was  supposed  to  represent 
the  public.  Other  Australian  states  adopted  this  system, 
and  by  1909  it  was  accepted  by  England.  "The  essence  of 
the  system  is  the  free  discussion  of  wage  standards,  by  the 
authorized  representatives  of  both  sides,  with  the  aid  and 
criticism  of  one  or  more  impartial  outsiders ;  the  fixing,  by 
this  bi-partisan  group,  of  standards  that  are  thereupon 
compulsory  upon  all  employers  in  the  industry;  and  the 
reservation  by  the  government  of  power  to  suspend  or 
otherwise  mitigate  rulings  that  appear  positively  unfair 
or  inexpedient.  No  definite  cost  of  living  criterion  is  set 
up.  The  level  of  the  standards  finally  fixed  will  rather  de- 
pend upon  the  general  temper  of  the  community  in  which 
the  law  is  operative  and  upon  the  respective  bargaining 
power  of  the  two  sides." ^  The  English  were  very  conserva- 
tive in  applying  a  minimum  wage  law.  The  law  specified 
four  trades,  but  provided  that  it  might  be  extended  to  other 


^Douglas,    Dorothy   W.,   Am.   Economic   Review,   Vol.    IX,    No.    4, 
p.  702. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  343 

trades,  if  the  Board  of  Trade  are  satisfied  that  the  rate  of 
wages  prevailing  in  the  trade  is  exceptionally  low,  as  com- 
pared with  that  in  other  emploj^ments,  and  that  the  other 
circumstances  of  the  trade  are  such  as  to  render  the  appli- 
cation of  the  act  expedient/  While  England  considers  first 
the  requirements  of  the  business  affected,  the  Victorian 
statute  in  Australia  requires  the  Court  of  Industrial  Ap- 
peals in  its  review  of  any  ruling  to  take  into  consideration 
a  living  wage  to  the  employees.-  The  law  of  England  and 
in  Australia  makes  provision  for  permits  by  which  infirm 
workers  may  receive  less  than  the  prescribed  minimum. 

The  first  organized  movement  for  a  minimum  wage  in 
this  country  began  about  twenty-five  years  ago  under  the 
leadership  of  the  National  Consumers  League.  That  league 
purposed  to  bring  about  more  satisfactory  standards  of  san- 
itation, hours,  child  labor  and  of  wages  by  persuading  the 
members  not  to  trade  with  those  failing  to  meet  the  require- 
ments of  such  standards.  The  League  found  from  exper- 
ience that  this  method  was  not  effective,  and  decided  that  it 
could  best  improve  the  condition  of  the  workers  through 
positive  law.  Accordingly  in  1908  the  league  made  the  ap- 
plication through  law  of  the  principle  of  the  minimum  wage 
a  part  of  its  Ten  Year  Program. 

In  1911  the  legislature  of  Massachusetts  passed  a  resolu- 
tion requesting  the  governor  to  appoint  a  commission  to 
study  the  matter  of  the  wages  of  women  and  of  minors. 
This  commission  made  a  report  asking  for  a  law  providing 
for  a  permanent  commission  which  should  inquire  into  the 
wages  of  women  in  any  occupation  in  the  commonwealth, 
appoint  wage  boards  for  each  occupation  in  question,  and 
pass  upon  the  recommendations  of  such  boards.  As  a  re- 
sult of  this  report  the  legislature  enacted  in  1912  a  mini- 
mum wage  law  for  Massachusetts,  the  first  of  such  laws  in 
the  United  States.  Eight  states  followed  by  passing  mini- 
mum wage  laws  in  1913;  two  in  1915;  one  in  1917;  The 
District  of  Columbia  in  1918;  two  in  1919.     The  chronolog- 


iBritish  Trade  Boards  Act,  1909,  sec.  1. 
2Factories  and  Shops  Act,  1912,  Sec.  175. 


344      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

ical  order  of  the  enactment  of  the  laws  in  the  different 
states  is  as  follows: 

1912— Massachusetts. 

1913 — California,  Colorado,  Minnesota,  Nebraska,  Ore- 
gon, Utah,  Washington,  Wisconsin. 

1915 — Arkansas,  Kansas. 

1917  — Arizona. 

1918 — District  of  Columbia. 

1919— North  Dakota,  Porto  Rico,  Texas.^ 

Massachusetts  took  the  lead  in  minimum  wage  legisla- 
tion, but  was  quite  conservative,  following  rather  timidly 
the  cautious  footsteps  of  English  experience.  A  commission 
was  provided  which  should  be  permanent  and  appointive 
and  which  should  inquire  into  the  wages  of  women  in  any 
occupation  when  there  should  be  reason  to  believe  that  the 
wages  paid  to  a  substantial  number  of  them  were  inade- 
quate to  supply  the  necessary  cost  of  living  and  to  maintain 
the  worker  in  health.  Upon  such  information  the  Com- 
mission is  authorized  to  establish  a  wage  board  consisting 
of  not  less  than  six  representatives  of  the  employers  in 
question  and  an  equal  number  of  female  employees  and  one 
or  more  disinterested  persons  to  represent  the  public.  Upon 
the  findings  of  this  wage  board  the  commission  may  make 
recommendations  as  to  what  the  wages  should  be.  If  the 
employers  affected  by  the  recommendations  should  not  heed 
them,  the  commission  may  publish  their  names  unless  such 
employers  can  show  that  compliance  would  render  it  im- 
possible for  them  to  conduct  business  at  a  reasonable  profit. 
Like  England  Massachusetts  requires  the  commission  to 
take  into  consideration  the  financial  condition  of  the  bus- 
iness affected  by  its  recommendations,  being  forbidden  to 
endanger  either  the  general  financial  prosperity  of  the 
trade  or  the  reasonable  profits  of  an  individual  employer. 
Massachusetts  relied  upon  publicity  to  constrain  offending 


^Foreign  countries  having  the  minimum  wage  are:  Australia,  Tas- 
mania, New  Zealand,  Great  Britain,  Alberta,  British  Columbia,  Sas- 
katchewan, Ontario,  Manitoba,  Quebec,  Nova  Scotia,  France,  Nor- 
way, Argentine  Republic,  and  Switzerland. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  345 

employers  to  pay  the  women  a  living  wage.  The  Massa- 
chusetts commission  it  seems  has  not  published  the  names 
of  employers  refusing  to  abide  by  their  recommendations, 
but  has  rather  published  some  lists  of  those  who  have  con- 
formed to  the  requirements  suggested  by  the  commission. 
Two  states  followed  Massachusetts  in  requiring  that  the 
financial  condition  of  the  industry  be  considered,  and  in 
refusing  to  clothe  the  commission  with  power  to  issue  man- 
datory orders.  These  states  were  Colorado  and  Nebraska, 
both  in  1913.  The  Colorado  statute  was  revised  in  1917,  and 
Nebraska  has  never  put  any  minimum  wage  into  operation. 
Massachusetts  therefore  remains  the  only  state  in  the  union 
in  which  a  minimum  wage  commission  may  act  only  in  an 
advisory  capacity,  and  which  is  required  to  take  the  finan- 
cial condition  of  the  business  into  consideration  in  making 
its  recommendations. 

Utah,  Arkansas,  and  Arizona,  have  prescribed  the  min- 
imum wage  by  legislative  act.  Utah  in  1913  fixed  the  min- 
imum wage  for  women  in  all  lines  of  industry  at  $7.50  for 
a  fifty-four  hour  week.  Arkansas  adopted  the  same  series 
of  state  wide  rates  as  Utah.  But  Arkansas  also  provided 
for  a  commission  which  might  revise  the  rates  by  localities 
or  trades  whenever  they  may  appear  too  high  or  too  low. 
This  part  of  the  law  was  never  put  into  operation.  During 
the  war  the  National  War  Labor  Board  found  the  minimum 
wage  of  $7.50  for  a  fifty-four  hour  week  still  in  force  and 
proceeded  in  August,  1918,  to  raise  the  minimum  for  laun- 
dry workers  to  $11.00  per  week.  Arizona,  in  1917,  passed 
the  most  inflexible  of  the  flat  rate  laws,  providing  a  min- 
imum of  $10.00  a  week  for  all  women,  of  whatever  age  or 
experience,  employed  in  manufacturing,  mercantile,  hotel, 
restaurant,  and  office  occupations.  This  type  of  legislation 
is  simple  and  inexpensive  to  administer.  Its  greatest  dis- 
advantage is  its  lack  of  flexibility. 

In  February,  1913,  the  state  of  Oregon  passed  a  minimum 
wage  law  which  in  the  main  has  been  followed  by  the  ma- 
jority of  the  states  which  have  such  laws.  The  Oregon  law 
provides  for  a  commission,  which  has  the  power  to  investi- 
gate conditions  of  employment  and  wages  in  an  industry. 


346      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

and  to  make  such  orders  as  to  hours  of  work,  conditions 
under  which  work  may  be  done,  or  minimum  wages,  as  in 
its  judgment  may  be  necessary  to  protect  the  health  and 
morals  of  women  and  minors.  Acting  under  the  powers  of 
this  statute  the  commission  appointed  a  board  to  investigate 
hours,  work  conditions  and  w^ages  as  they  affected  women 
and  minors  in  manufacturing,  and  upon  the  information 
thus  gathered  and  the  recommendations  made,  it  issued  an 
order  which  among  other  things  required  that  an  exper- 
ienced woman  employed  in  any  manufacturing  establishment 
within  the  state  of  Oregon,  should  receive  for  her  work  not 
less  than  $8.64  per  week.  An  injunction  was  sought  and  the 
constitutionality  of  the  act  was  attacked.  The  Supreme 
Court  of  Oregon  decided  that  it  was  bound  by  the  judgment 
of  the  legislature  that  it  was  necessary  to  invoke  the  police 
power  of  the  state  to  protect  the  health  and  morals  of 
women  and  minors  through  prescribing  a  minimum  wage, 
and  that  in  passing  this  law  the  legislature  had  not  delegated 
legislative  powers  to  a  commission.^  The  case  was  carried 
to  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  United  States  on  the  contention 
that  the  act  violated  the  provisions  of  the  fourteenth  amend- 
ment. Justice  Brandeis,  having  been  retained  as  counsel 
in  the  case  before  his  appointment  as  Associate  Justice,  was 
disqualified  and  did  not  sit  in  the  case.  The  court  was  evenly 
divided,  four  finding  that  the  Oregon  statute  was  not  in  vio- 
lation of  the  Constitution  and  four  finding  it  unconsitu- 
tional.-  The  members  of  the  Supreme  Court  being  evenly 
divided  the  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Oregon  held, 
and  the  law  was  therefore  constitutional  and  valid. 

The  decisions  of  the  Commission  of  Oregon  are  binding 
upon  the  employers  involved.  The  orders  of  the  commis- 
sion are  mandatory.  Moreover  the  Oregon  law  does  not  re- 
quire that  the  financial  condition  of  the  business  shall  be 
considered.  It  is  required  by  the  law  to  make  its  findings 
and  orders  in  the  interest  of  the  health  and  morals  of  women 
and  minors.     The  following  states  have  followed  Oregon 


iStetler  vs.  O'Hara,  139  Pac.  Rep.,  743. 
-37  Sup.  Ct.  Rep.,  475. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  347 

in  creating  commissions  with  mandatory  powers,  and  in 
limiting  their  investigations  to  the  interests  of  the  women 
and  children:  California,  Colorado  in  1917  after  having 
followed  the  Massachusetts  model  for  four  years,  Minnesota, 
Washington,  Wisconsin,  Kansas,  The  District  of  Columbia, 
North  Dakota,  and  Texas. 

A  minimum  wage  law  for  women  and  minors  in  Texas 
was  passed  by  the  Legislature  on  March  12,  1919,  was  ap- 
proved by  the  Governor  on  April  3,  and  became  effective 
June  18  of  that  year.^  The  act  established  an  Industrial 
Welfare  Commission  composed  of  the  head  of  the  Bureau  of 
Labor  Statistics,  chairman,  the  representative  of  employers 
on  the  Industrial  Accident  Board,  and  the  State  Superin- 
tendent of  Public  Instruction.    The  Commission  was  to  have 


'Note:  The  following  information  concerning  the  history  of  min- 
imum wage  legislation  in  Texas  has  been  compiled  by  Miss  Octavia 
Rogan  of  the  State  Library: 

In  1911  the  Texas  State  Federation  of  Labor  adopted  a  resolution 
signed  by  P.  J.  Duffy  favoring  a  minimum  wage  law  for  the  State. 
The  resolution  stated  that  the  average  wage  for  working  girls  in 
Texas  was  four  dollars  per  week.  In  1913  the  Texas  State  Federa- 
tion pledged  all  of  its  strength  and  influence  to  pass  a  minimum 
wage  law  for  all  women  in  the  event  employers  should  reduce  their 
wages  because  of  the  fifty-four  hour  law.  In  1914  the  State  Federa- 
tion approved  the  minimum  wage  law,  and  suggested  that  it  be 
copied  from  one  of  the  best  or  that  of  Minnesota.  In  1915  two  bills 
providing  for  a  minimum  wage  were  introduced  into  the  Legislature. 
The  Senate  bill  was  reported  favorably  out  of  committee.  In  1917 
a  minimum  wage  bill  was  introduced  into  the  Senate.  It  did  not 
get  up  for  a  vote.  It  was  opposed  by  the  Retail  Merchants  Associa- 
tion. Unsuccessful  attempts  were  made  to  get  the  bill  introduced 
at  the  first  three  called  sessions  of  1917.  In  1918  the  State  Federa- 
tion of  Labor  adopted  as  a  first  preferential  measure  a  resolution 
demanding  of  all  candidates  for  the  Legislature  a  pledge  to  vote 
for  a  minimum  wage  commission  so  that  "women  workers  may  be 
guaranteed,  not  a  living  wage  but  a  wage  in  keeping  with  the  cost 
of  living  and  conditions  surrounding  them  in  different  communities 
of  Texas  that  will  guarantee  to  them  all  that  is  necessary  to  make 
life  comfortable  and  happy."  In  the  Democratic  Platform  for  Texas 
in  1918  is  found  the  following  statement:  "We  favor  the  enactment 
of  such  laws  as  will  tend  to  improve  conditions  under  which  women 
work,  especially  to  insure  them  a  living  wage."  At  the  regular  ses- 
sion of  1919  two  bills  were  introduced. 


348      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

the  assistance  of  a  secretary  and  two  investigators,  pro- 
vided they  should  not  cost  more  than  $1800  each  and 
necessary  travelling  expenses.  The  Commission  was 
charged  with  the  duty  of  ascertaining  the  wages  paid,  the 
hours  and  conditions  of  employment  in  the  various  occupa- 
tions, trades  and  industries  in  which  women  and  minors 
are  employed,  and  to  make  investigations  into  the  comfort, 
health,  safety  and  welfare  of  such  women  and  minors.  The 
act  defines  a  minor  as  a  person  of  either  sex  under  the  age 
of  fifteen  years.  It  requires  every  person,  firm  and  corpora- 
tion employing  labor  in  the  state  to  furnish  to  the  Commis- 
sion any  and  all  information  it  may  require,  and  to  permit 
representatives  of  the  Commission  to  enter  upon  their  prem- 
ises for  purposes  of  investigation,  and  to  keep -a  register  of 
the  names,  ages  and  residence  addresses  of  all  women  and 
minors  employed.  The  Commission  was  empowered  to  hold 
public  hearings,  at  which  time  employers,  employees  or 
other  interested  persons  might  appear  and  give  testimony 
as  to  the  matter  under  consideration.  It  was  provided  that 
after  a  public  hearing  before  any  member  of  the  Commis- 
sion, or  before  any  investigator  employed  by  the  Commis- 
sion, the  Commission  should  have  power  upon  its  own  mo- 
tion or  upon  petition  to  fix  a  minimum  wage  to  be  paid  to 
women  and  minors  engaged  in  any  occupation,  trade  or  in- 
dustry in  the  state,  which  shall  not  be  less  than  a  wage  ade- 
quate to  supply  such  women  and  minors  the  necessary  cost 
of  proper  living  and  to  maintain  their  health  and  welfare, 
and  to  fix  the  standard  conditions  of  labor  demanded  by  the 
health  and  welfare  of  women  and  minors  so  employed.  The 
Commission  might  in  its  discretion,  make  a  mandatory  order 
effective  in  sixty  days,  specifying  the  minimum  wage  and 
the  standard  conditions  of  labor  for  women  and  minors  in 
the  occupation  in  question,  provided  no  such  order  should 
become  effective  before  November  1, 1919.  The  Commission 
may,  after  a  public  hearing,  rescind,  alter  or  amend  any 
prior  order.  Provision  is  made  for  employment  of  persons 
at  less  than  the  prescribed  minimum  by  special  license 
granted  by  the  Commission.  Such  a  permit  may  be  granted 
for  only  six  months  at  a  time,  and  no  more  than  ten  per 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  349 

cent  of  the  employees  in  an  establishment  would  be  granted 
the  license.  This  was  primarily  to  make  some  provision  for 
the  inefficient  who  might  be  crowded  out  through  the  opera- 
tion of  the  minimum  wage.  The  Commission  may  call  upon 
the  Labor  Commissioner  to  gather  information  which  may 
be  helpful  in  enabling  them  to  arrive  at  a  minimum  wage  or 
a  standard  of  conditions  of  labor.  For  violating  an  order 
of  the  Commission  the  penalty  was  fixed  at  a  fine  of  not  less 
than  ten  dollars  nor  more  than  one  hundred  dollars,  or  by 
imprisonment  of  not  more  than  thirty  days  in  the  county 
jail,  or  by  both  such  fine  and  imprisonment.  Any  employee 
receiving  less  than  the  minimum  wage  applicable  in  her 
case  may  bring  a  civil  action  to  recover  the  unpaid  balance 
with  court  costs  and  attorneys  fees,  even  though  she  had 
agreed  to  work  for  less  than  the  wage  prescribed  as  a  min- 
imum. Domestic  servants,  nurses,  student  nurses,  farm  or 
ranch  labor,  and  students  in  attendance  at  schools  and  col- 
leges, were  exempt  from  the  provisions  and  benefits  of  the 
act.  The  sum  of  five  thousand  dollars  was  appropriated 
to  be  used  in  carrying  out  the  provisions  of  the  act.  A 
further  sum  of  $13,500  for  each  of  two  fiscal  years  ending 
August  31,.  1921,  was  added. 

Ill 

We  may  now  raise  two  questions.  Is  the  minimum  wage 
legislation  necessary?  Is  it  expedient?  In  support  of  the 
claim  that  such  a  law  may  be  necessary,  it  is  argued  that 
there  is  a  maladjustment  of  the  supply  of  and  demand  for 
unskilled  female  laborers.  The  demand  for  unskilled  women 
in  industry  and  in  commerce  is  a  decentralized  demand. 
There  is  no  way  of  knowing  how  many  women  are  wanted 
in  the  various  employments  of  the  country.  There  is  no  way 
of  knowing  how  many  women  are  needed  in  the  shops,  mills, 
stores,  hostleries,  and  offices  of  any  state,  or  of  any  city. 
Each  employer  as  a  rule  acts  alone,  and  without  reference  to 
others  in  seeking  unskilled  labor.  Two  stores  in  the  same 
block  handling  identical  lines,  ordinarily  act  independently 
of  each  other,  and  may  offer  different  wages  for  the  same 


350      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

kind  of  work.  If  a  woman  wants  a  position  in  a  department 
store,  even  though  there  may  be  a  dozen  such  stores  in  her 
city,  or  a  hundred  in  her  state,  there  is  no  one  agency  to 
which  she  can  apply  in  order  to  know  if  her  services  may 
be  desired  in  any  one  of  these  stores.  Instead  she  must  go 
from  store  to  store.  In  her  wanderings  in  search  of  employ- 
ment, she  finds  that  firms  pay  differing  wages  for  a  certain 
grade  of  help.  Each  store,  each  shop,  each  place  of  em- 
ployment is  ordinarily  going  it  alone  as  an  employer,  and 
those  desiring  employment  must  as  a  rule  seek  it  from  place 
to  place. 

Moreover,  the  supply  of  unskilled  female  labor  is  de- 
centralized. There  is  little  effort  to  mobilize  such  workers. 
There  is  no  card  index  giving  names,  addresses,  and  qual- 
ifications of  all  of  the  women  available  for  employment  in 
the  city  or  the  state,  to  which  an  employer  may  go  when  in 
need  of  a  larger  force.  Instead  the  employer  advertises  Or 
by  means  of  his  own  attracts  applicants  to  his  place,  from 
whom  he  selects  those  wanted.  Those  not  taken  lose  car 
fare,  time,  and  selfrespect,  and  sometimes  hope.  The  fact 
that  there  is  a  job  in  the  place  around  the  corner  from  the 
one  which  rejected  an  applicant  may  be  unknown  to  the  de- 
feated candidate,  and  she  in  her  disappointment  may  not 
have  the  courage  to  go  into  a  place  about  whose  needs  she 
has  no  information.  If  a  woman  seeks  a  place  which  pays 
twelve  dollars  a  week  and  fails  to  get  it,  and  then  goes  to  an- 
other employer  who  has  identical  work  to  be  done,  but  offers 
her  but  ten  dollars  per  week,  it  is  of  no  assistance  to  her 
that  the  employer  across  the  street  is  paying  two  dollars  a 
week  more  for  that  work.  The  demand  in  one  place  is  sep- 
arate and  apart  from  the  demand  in  the  other  place. 

Then  the  supply  of  women  workers  is  relatively  immobile. 
A  woman  cannot  tramp  about  from  community  to  communi- 
ty in  search  of  employment.  She  must  get  employment  as  a 
rule  in  the  place  of  her  residence.  If  she  be  a  woman  adrift, 
she  has  no  way  to  know  the  facts  about  opportunities  for 
employment  in  other  communities.  Only  accident,  or  the  in- 
terest of  a  personal  friend  may  aid  her  in  getting  a  place  in 
another  town.     To  the  unskilled  worker,  car  fare  is  quite 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  351 

an  item.  She  is  discouraged  sometimes  from  seeking  employ- 
nient  beyond  walking  distance  from  her  residence.  But 
distance  from  work  is  of  more  importance  than  car  fare. 
The  time  consumed  in  riding  to  and  from  work  is  in  effect 
added  to  the  working  day.  There  are  difficulties  in  moving 
from  one  part  of  a  city  to  another  almost  comparable  to 
those  of  moving  from  one  town  to  another. 

Again  a  woman  is  a  poor  bargainer  for  a  job.  Her  psy- 
chology unfits  her  for  such  bargaining.  As  a  girl  she  has 
usually  looked  forward  to  marriage.  She  has  been  taught 
that  it  is  for  men  to  choose  their  wives,  while  the  woman 
chosen  has  a  veto  upon  the  choice  of  her  suitor.  But  in 
business  she  cannot  wait  for  the  job  to  come  courting  her. 
She  must  go  out  "boldly"  and  make  the  proposal  to  the  job. 
Diffident,  timid,  shrinking,  without  experience,  without  skill 
in  any  work,  conscious  of  her  ignorance  of  all  that  goes 
under  the  name  of  business,  she  must  approach  a  well  in- 
formed, astute,  and  strange  man,  who  may  or  may  not  have 
control  of  work  which  she  could  learn  to  do.  Moreover,  it  is 
necessary  that  she  have  work,  else  she  would  not  as  a  rule 
seek  gainful  employment.  Her  support  in  part  or  in  whole, 
perhaps  the  support  of  others,  depends  upon  her  success  in 
obtaining  and  holding  a  position.  There  is  an  irreducible 
minimum  of  subsistence  below  which  she  cannot  go.  If  she 
cannot  earn  enough  to  pay  for  this  subsistence,  she  must  be- 
come the  recipient  of  charity,  or  perhaps  lose  her  health  and 
strength  to  work.  If  she  cannot  get  a  living  wage,  she  must 
take  less  than  a  living.  For  something  toward  meeting  un- 
avoidable expenses  is  better  than  nothing.  If  ^he  find  an 
opening  with  ever  so  low  a  wage,  she  is  likely  to  be  afraid 
to  reject  the  place,  not  knowing  that  she  could  do  better, 
and  fearful  she  might  do  worse. 

In  contrast  with  the  weak  bargaining  power  of  the  inex- 
perienced women,  is  the  strong  bargaining  power  of  the  em- 
ployer. The  greater  the  number  of  his  employees,  the 
greater  his  relative  advantage  as  a  bargainer.  He  is  well 
informed,  he  knows  much  about  the  supply  of  women 
workers.  He  can  easily  do  without  any  one  of  his  unskilled 
employees.    If  he  employ  a  hundred  such,  there  will  be  lit- 


352      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

tie  difference  between  what  he  can  get  from  ninety-nine,  and 
what  a  hundred  would  do.  If  he  employ  a  thousand,  th'e 
relative  importance  of  a  single  individual  is  much  less.  The 
employer  can  often  be  indifferent.  The  woman  feels  that 
she  must  have  employment.  Her  comfort,  her  health,  per- 
haps her  life,  as  she  sees  it,  depends  upon  her  getting  a  posi- 
tion. When  so  much  is  at  stake  on  one  hand,  and  so  little  on 
the  other,  there  is  vast  difference  in  bargaining  power. 

Then  there  are  often  strong  reasons  urging  the  employer 
who  has  such  an  advantage  to  be  a  hard  bargainer.  His 
competitors  may  be  cutting  prices,  and  to  meet  their  com- 
petition he  may  seek  to  keep  wages  down  or  to  reduce  them. 
Perhaps  his  competitor  is  paying  low  wages  and  he  decides 
that  he  can  attract  customers  only  by  meeting  the  prices  of 
the  employer  who  "sweats'*  his  employees,  and  that  to  do 
that  he  too  must  transform  his  establishment  into  a  sweat- 
shop. Or  a  given  employer  may  not  be  a  successful  or- 
ganizer of  his  business.  For  some  reason  he  may  be  failing. 
A  hard  pressed  employer  is  the  strongest  bargainer  for 
labor.  He  cannot  pay  current  or  living  wages  and  stay  in 
business.  Self  preservation  drives  him  to  keep  wages  down. 
No  unskilled  woman  has  the  ghost  of  a  show  in  bargaining 
for  a  living  wage  with  such  an  employer.  Another  type  of 
hard  bargainer  is  the  one  dominated  by  greed  or  avarice. 
Out  of  sheer  lust  for  gain  such  employers  "sweat"  the  de- 
fenceless and  helpless  women  who  feel  that  of  necessity  they 
must  accept  employment  under  such  employers. 

What  are  some  of  the  effects  of  this  maladjustment  of  de- 
mand for  and  supply  of  unskilled  w^omen  workers?  First 
is  low  wages  for  such  women.  An  investigation  of  the  pay- 
rolls before  the  war  revealed  that  of  the  women  and  girls 
employed  in  eight  department  stores  in  Chicago,  6.2  per 
cent  earned  less  than  $4.00  per  week ;  23.3  per  cent  less  than 
$6.00  per  week;  53.4  per  cent  less  than  $8.00  per  week.^ 
From  investigations  of  the  salaries  of  women  and  girls  em- 
ployed in  stores  in  New  York,  Chicago,  Philadelphia,  St. 


iThis  information  is  given  in  an  article  by  Professor  H.  A.  Millis 
in  the  Journal  of  Political  Economy,  Vol.  XXII,  page  132. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  353 

Louis,  Boston,  Minneapolis,  and  St.  Paul,  the  Federal 
Bureau  of  Labor  found  that  in  these  seven  cities  of  those 
living  with  their  families,  34.6  per  cent  earned  less  than 
$6.00  a  week ;  and  68.7  per  cent  were  earning  less  than  $8.00 
a  week.  Of  those  "adrift,"  19.3  per  cent  earned  less  than 
$6.00  a  week;  and  58.6  per  cent  were  receiving  less  than 
$8.00  a  week. 

While  the  wages  in  stores  were  low,  those  paid  women  and 
girls  in  factories,  where  they  were  not  attracted  by  social  op- 
portunities, nor  by  the  desire  to  be  w^ell  dressed,  were  even 
lower.  It  was  found  that  in  the  manufacturies  of  men's 
clothing  in  New  York,  Rochester,  Philadelphia,  Baltimore, 
and  Chicago,  where  this  industry  is  extensively  localized,  49 
in  every  100  earned  less  than  $6.00  a  week.  In  Chicago  they 
averaged  $7.15  a  week;  in  Rochester,  $6.95;  in  New  York, 
$5.74 ;  in  Philadelphia,  $6.00 ;  and  in  Baltimore,  4.82.  The 
Massachusetts  minimum  wage  commission  found  in  1910 
earning  less  than  $6.00  per  week  62.2  per  cent  of  the  women 
over  eighteen  years  of  age  in  candy  factories ;  29.5  per  cent 
of  those  in  retail  stores ;  40.7  per  cent  of  those  in  laundries ; 
37.9  per  cent  of  those  in  cotton  factories.  For  those  earn- 
ing less  than  $8.00  per  week  the  percentages  were  93.1  in 
candy  factories ;  60.4  per  cent  in  retail  stores ;  75.1  per  cent 
in  laundries ;  and  66.8  per  cent  in  cotton  factories.^ 


J  The  following  table  prepared  by  the  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics 
and  published  in  the  Monthly  Labor  Review  for  October,  1919,  in- 
dicates how  the  expenses  of  living  have  increased  since  1914: 

Per  Cent  of  Increase  in  Cost  of  Living  Since  July,  1914: 

Country  as  a  Whole, 
18  Shipbuildinsr               Other  Cities     Excluding  Agricultural 
Month  and  Year Centers and  Towns Communities 

December,  1914. . .  2  2  2 

June,  1915 2  2  2 

December,  1915...  3  3  3 

June,  1916 9  9  9 

December,  1916...  17  17  17 

June,   1917 30  27  28 

December,  1917.  ..  44  39  41 

June,  1918 60  53  56 

December,  1918...  76  67  72 

June,  1919 80  70  75 

June,  1920,  retail  prices  of  food  in  forty-five  cities  had  increased 
215  per  cent  over  June,  1914.     Labor  Review,  Jan.,  1921,  p.  92. 


354      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

The  average  earning  of  women  workers  throughout  the 
United  States  in  21  industries  was^ : 

Computed 

average 

Average  earnings 

hours  Average       per  week 

worked         earnings       if  6  days 

Industry  No.  of      No.  of  Em-  per  week        per  hour  were 

States  ployees day worked         worked 

Glass   9  1,903  7.3  $0,231  $10l2 

Confectionery    19  11,176  7.4  .231  10.25 

Furniture     12  915  8.1  .214  10.40 

Boxes,  paper   10  4,297  7.5  .242  10.89 

Chemicals   .' 16  710  7.5  .272  12.24 

Oreralls    19  6,439  6.7  .305  12.26 

Hosiery  and  underwear  15  13,374  7.6  .286  13.04 

Leather 8  1,054  6.9  .317  13.12 

Pottery    4  1,115  6.8  .324  13.22 

Paper    and    pulp 14  1,947  8.0  .278  13.34 

Typewriters   10  3,433  7.8  .300  14.04 

Electrical  machinery.  .  8  1,618  7.6  .322  14.68 

Clothing,   men's    9  9,725  7.3  .338  14.80 

Cigars   10  11,278  7.6  .326  14.87 

Rubber    9  3,420  7.6  .326  14.87 

Iron   and   steel 2  159  6.1  .419  15.34 

Silk    7  5,608  7.8  .335  15.68 

Machine  tools    6  154  7.7  .345  15.94 

Clothing,  women's    ...  7  6,782  7.4  .368  16.34 

Automobiles     7  622  7.8  .380  17.78 

Total 32  85,812  7.5  .301  $13.54 

The  Labor  Department  of  Texas  in  1916  made  an  estimate 
that  one-half  the  women  workers  of  Texas  were  receiving 
at  that  time  less  than  six  dollars  per  week ;  that  many  were 
receiving  only  four  dollars ;  and  some  as  little  as  three  dol- 
lars.2 

A  second  effect  is  a  big  turnover  of  unskilled  labor  as 
recruited  from  the  ranks  of  the  women.  At  the  best  the 
turnover  of  female  is  greater  than  that  of  male  workers. 
Women  pass  out  of  industry  into  matrimony,  and  many  of 
them  come  back  to  industry  as  more  or  less  regular  workers. 

iSee  Bulletin  No.  265.  Industrial  Survey  in  Selected  industries  in 
the  United  States,  1919,  published  by  the  United  States  Bureau  of 
Labor  Statistics,  May,  1920;  also  "Earnings  of  Women  in  Factories" 
by  National  Consumers  League,  January,  1921. 

^Biennial  Report  of  Texas  Bureau  of  Labor  Statistics,  1915-1916, 
p.  13.     Ihid,  1917-1918,  p.  28. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  355 

Low  wages,  and  poor  adjustment  of  labor  demand  to 
labor  supply  tends  to  increase  the  turnover.  There  is  less 
incentive  to  work  for  a  hard  bargaining  employer  at  a  low 
wage,  than  there  would  be  if  wages  and  conditions  were 
more  satisfactory.  The  expense  of  an  avoidable  labor  turn- 
over is  considerable.  There  is  the  cost  of  hiring  the  woman ; 
then  the  cost  of  training  her ;  the  cost  of  materials  destroyed 
in  the  learning  process,  and  of  extra  power  and  reduced  out- 
put by  reason  of  inexperience  of  beginners,  greater  wear 
and  tear  on  machinery ;  the  cost  of  an  increased  number  of 
accidents  due  to  greater  carelessness  or  less  competency  of 
learners;  and  the  expense  of  making  replacements  and  ad- 
justments because  of  defective  goods  sent  out,  and  the  con- 
sequent loss  of  good  will  and  business.^ 

A  third  result  is  a  lowering  standard  of  living.  Low 
wages  will  not  meet  the  requirements  of  a  very  high 
standard  of  living.  Native  born  American  women  find 
themselves  in  competition  with  foreign  women,  who  have 
been  accustomed  to  a  low  level  of  existence.  After  being 
compelled  for  a  number  of  years  to  eke  out  a  mere  existence 
women  often  become  confirmed  in  an  abnormally  low  stand- 
ard of  living.  Such  a  situation  is  pathological,  and  is  apt 
to  perpetuate  itself  through  the  influence  of  these  crushed 
women  upon  those  about  them. 

In  the  fourth  place,  the  poor  wages  and  uncertain  employ- 
ment resulting  from  this  maladjustment  tends  to  keep  the 
efficiency  of  the  women  workers  from  reaching  the  stand- 
ards easily  possible  under  more  favorable  conditions.  And 
this  lack  of  development  in  turn  helps  to  keep  the  woman  in 
the  ranks  of  the  unskilled. 

A  fifth  undesired  effect  is  the  development  in  many  in- 
stances of  bitter  feeling  among  the  women  workers  against 
the  employing  class.    The  writer  has  listened  to  such  women 


^Sumner  Slichter:    "The  Turnover  of  Factory  Labor,"  p.  108. 


356      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

at  public  hearings  as  they  gave  expression  to  discontent, 
bitterness  of  feeling,  and  even  hatred  of  employers,  v^hich 
was  apparently  due  to  years  of  disappointment,  and  to  the 
long  grind  of  unremunerative  toil,  and  not  so  far  as  could 
be  ascertained  to  the  specific  act  of  any  particular  employer. 
What  could  be  less  desirable  than  for  a  large  number  of 
citizens  to  feel  that  they  are  suffering  from  injustice,  and 
to  entertain  thoughts  of  rebellion  against  an  order  in  which 
they  think  of  themselves  as  victims  ? 

A  sixth  consequence  which  may  be  mentioned  is  im- 
morality. Most  social  workers  testify  that  there  is  a  con- 
nection between  immorality  and  low  wages.  The  investiga- 
tions of  this  problem  have  been  fragmentary  and  unsatis- 
factory, and  have  usually  taken  the  form  of  compiling  the 
opinions  of  those  who  seek  to  help  fallen  women.  The  writer 
is  inclined  to  believe  that  virtue  is  a  much  prized  and  as 
carefully  protected  in  poverty  as  in  riches,  and  cannot  com- 
mit himself,  in  the  absence  of  any  dependable  investigation 
of  the  facts,  to  the  proposition  that  want  drives  women 
from  the  paths  of  rectitude. 

It  is  too  much  to  claim  for  one  remedy  that  it  will  cure 
all  the  ills  that  flow  from  the  maladjustment  we  have  been 
considering.  The  factors  are  too  many,  the  problems  too 
complex,  for  one  legislative  act  to  promise  a  complete  solu- 
tion. But  no  claim  is  made  for  the  minimum  wage  laws 
that  they  leave  nothing  further  to  be  done.  The  most  that 
is  claimed  is  that  the  situation  is  so  grave,  that  unskilled 
women  are  at  such  a  disadvantage  in  bargaining,  that  em- 
ployers are  so  often  driven  by  circumstances  to  be  hard 
bargainers  even  against  their  will,  that  it  is  necessary  to 
invoke  the  police  power  of  the  state  and  prescribe  a  min- 
imum below  which  no  employer  would  be  permitted  to  en- 
gage the  services  of  a  woman  or  of  a  child.  The  respons- 
ibility for  promoting  the  general  welfare,  and  for  protect- 
ing the  defenceless  is  clearly  that  of  the  representatives  of 
the  people  in  the  legislature. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  357 

It  may  be  asked  if  such  a  law  is  expedient?  If  its  en- 
forcement is  practicable?  Would  its  enforcement  entail  so 
heavy  a  burden  upon  industry  as  to  close  the  doors  of  fac- 
tories and  of  shops  and  thus  drive  employees  into  the 
street?  Or  would  it  discourage  enterprise  and  bring  a  de- 
pression of  business,  or  so  curtail  profits  that  able  men 
would  no  longer  be  attracted  to  undertake  new  enterprises  ? 
If  all  the  states  would  enact  and  enforce  minimum  wage 
laws,  it  is  likely  that  five  million  women  would  be  affected. 
Their  wages  would  probably  be  raised  as  much  as  six  dollars 
per  week  on  an  average.  That  is  to  say  the  pay  roll  of  the 
country  would  be  increased  thirty  millions  a  week  or  one 
billion  and  five  hundred  million  each  year.  At  first  glance 
it  would  seem  that  this  is  a  large  sum.  But  when  we  con- 
sider that  it  will  be  distributed  over  the  entire  country, 
through  business  of  every  variety  from  the  small  shop  to 
the  great  factory,  it  does  not  appear  so  formidable.  The 
excess  profits  tax  last  year  and  the  federal  income  tax 
amounted  to  $3,944,000,000.  The  gains  to  business  from  the 
increased  eflftciency  of  better  paid,  better  fed,  better  clothed, 
better  housed,  more  content,  and  more  loyal  employees  would 
greatly  reduce  the  actual  cost  of  such  an  increase. 

In  Texas  about  200,000  women  would  be  affected.  If  a 
minimum  really  providing  a  living  wage  were  enforced,  the 
average  increase  would  likely  be  about  $5.00  a  week  for  each 
of  those  women.  That  would  be  an  addition  of  $1,000,000 
to  the  weekly  pay  roll,  and  $52,000,000  to  the  annual  wage 
bill  of  Texas.  Texas  last  year  paid  $103,000,000  federal 
taxes. 

The  effects  of  the  enforcement  of  a  minimum  wage  in 
Texas  will  be  very  much  those  that  have  been  and  are  being 
realized  in  other  states  which  are  enforcing  such  measures. 

First  there  will  be  a  tendency  of  the  women  in  the  trades 
regulated  to  organize.  Once  their  bargaining  power  is 
strengthened  by  exercise  of  the  police  power  of  the  state  in 
their  behalf,  they  will  be  encouraged  to  organize  and  further 
strengthen  their  power  in  bargaining.  A  second  result  will 
be  the  lowering  of  the  wages  of  some  who  now  receive  more 
than  a  minimum  wage.    Employers  will  be  able  to  recoup 


358      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

some  of  their  losses  from  the  increase  of  those  now  re- 
ceiving less  than  a  living  by  cutting  down  in  some  instances 
the  wages  of  those  receiving  more.  Third  some  forms  of 
business  in  competition  with  establishments  in  other  states 
which  have  no  minimum  wage  laws,  would  find  themselves 
harder  put  to  it  to  meet  with  success  their  competitors  in 
the  market.  At  certain  points  business  would  perhaps  be 
iniured.^  Fourth,  in  some  cases  the  increase  in  wages 
could  be  shifted  in  the  form  of  higher  prices  to  the  con- 
sumer, and  the  cost  of  living  might  be  somewhat  increased. 
Fifth,  some,  but  very  few,  now  employed  would  be  forced 
out,  because  they  are  not  worth  to  their  employers  as  much 
as  a  living  wage.  Society  would  have  to  face  more  squarely 
the  problems  of  the  unemployable,  and  of  the  defectives. 
Sixth,  wages  would  be  more  standardized,  and  the  exploita- 
tion of  women  would  be  checked.  Seventh,  various  petty 
annoyances,  as  fines,  penalties,  charges  for  services  that 
would  go  along  with  the  job,  would  perhaps  be  eliminated. 
Eighth,  men  would  to  a  certain  extent  be  protected  from  the 
underbidding  of  women.  Ninth,  all  this  would  result  in 
fewer  disputes.  Tenth,  there  would  be  a  great  saving  from 
reduced  turnover.  Eleventh,  there  would  be  a  decided  in- 
crease in  the  productivity  of  the  workers  affected.  Twelfth, 
the  welfare  of  the  women  would  be  tremendously  improved. 
The  increase  in  health,  contentment,  and  happiness  would 
be  incalculable.  Thirteenth,  there  would  be  a  resulting 
goodwill,  which  would  show  itself  in  reduced  costs  per  unit 
of  product.  Fourteenth,  there  would  be  a  decided  check  to 
the  spread  of  radicalism.  The  reds,  and  I.  W.  W's.  thrive 
upon  discontent,  bitterness,  and  wretchedness.  Sufficient 
food  and  reasonable  comfort  are  deadly  to  much  radical 
propaganda. 

IV. 

As  we  have  seen,  the  minimum  wage  legislation  is  based 
upon  the  assumption  that  a  normal  woman  should  be  able 
to  earn  enough  to  support  herself.     The  statute  in  Texas 


iH.  A.  Millis,  loc.  cit. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  359 

clothes  the  Industrial  Welfare  Commission  with  power, 
after  investigation,  to  fix  a  minimum  wage  for  women  and 
minors  which  shall  not  be  less  than  a  wage  adequate  to 
supply  the  necessary  cost  of  proper  living  and  to  maintain 
their  health  and  welfare.  The  questions  at  once  arise,  what 
constitutes  a  proper  living?  How  determine  the  necessary 
cost  of  proper  living?  Shall  it  be  assumed  that  women  and 
minors  already  have  a  proper  living  provided  for  them 
and  that  they  merely  work  for  extra  money ;  or  that  those 
living  at  home  get  a  living  for  much  less  than  it  would 
otherwise  cost?  Or  shall  it  be  assumed  that  such  workers 
whether  living  at  home  or  adrift  should  receive  enough  for 
their  work  to  enable  them  to  pay  others  from  their  wages 
for  a  proper  living?  Or  should  it  be  assumed  that  women 
and  minors  may  have  dependents  to  whose  support  they 
must  contribute,  before  having  anything  to  apply  to  the 
expenses  of  their  own  living?^ 

1.  There  are  some  who  contend  that  women  and  minors 
do  not  have  to  work  and  that  whatever  they  may  receive  is 
so  much  gain  for  them.  Perhaps  some  may  contend  that 
society  should  assume  the  responsibility  for  the  training 
and  support  of  minors  in  the  absence  of  ability  of  parents 
to  discharge  these  responsibilities.  But  it  could  hardly  be 
maintained  that  society  is  under  any  obligation  to  support 
a  normal  adult  woman.  Should  such  a  woman  betreated 
as  one  who  does  not  have  to  depend  upon  her  efforts  for 
support?  Do  many  women  work  for  mere  pin  money? 
There  are  many  women  who  do  not  live  at  home  for  the 
simple  reason  that  they  have  no  homes.  Then  many  of  the 
working  women  who  do  live  at  home  find  it  necessary  to 
contribute  to  the  family  budget.  The  Bureau  of  Labor 
found  that  in  Chicago  78.7  per  cent  of  the  girls  working 
in  stores  contributed  all  their  earnings  to  the  family  fund ; 
that  81.3  per  cent  of  those  employed  in  factories  made  such 
contributions.    Many  of  the  girls  who  testified  before  the  In- 


iThe  question  of  ccst  of  living  for  working  women,  is  admirably 
discussed  by  Dorothy  Douglas  in  the  Quartely  Journal  of  Econonnics 
for  February,  1920. 


360      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

dustrial  Welfare  Commission  of  Texas  stated  that  they 
turned  their  pay  checks  over  to  their  families.  Women  do 
not  as  a  rule  go  out  and  work  in  gainful  occupations  except 
from  necessity.  If  they  did,  if  no  woman  needed  gainful 
employment,  why  should  they  receive  for  their  work  less 
than  a  living  wage? 

2.  It  is  argued  that  the  living  expenses  of  those  who 
are  with  their  families  is  much  less  than  if  they  were  alone. 
A  majority  of  the  women  receiving  low  wages  do  live  at 
home,  and  share  the  benefits  of  the  household  economy. 
This  joint  costs  theory  is  held  by  those  who  would  justify 
the  establishments  which  seek  only  such  female  employees 
as  live  at  home,  and  pay  them  less  than  would  be  required 
if  they  did  not  draw  a  part  of  their  support  from  a  coopera- 
tive institution,  the  family.^  What  are  the  advantages  of 
the  household  economy  to  the  working  girl?  Some  of  the 
more  obvious  are:  (1)  free  room.  The  rent  is  paid  for 
the  family,  and  would  have  to  be  paid  if  the  daughter  were 
not  at  home.  This  assumes  that  no  larger  or  better  house 
is  wanted  by  reason  of  the  daughter's  presence.  (2)  Free 
service  on  the  part  of  those  cooking  and  serving  the  meals. 
(3)  Much  free  laundry.  (4)  Much  free  sewing  and  mend- 
ing. But  why  are  such  important  services  as  cooking,  sew- 
ing, and  laundrying,  free  to  the  young  women  at  home? 
Only  because  some  other  member  of  the  family,  usually  the 
mother,  renders  these  services.  Such  services  would  cost 
several  dollars  each  week,  if  rendered  by  someone  from  the 
outside.  They  are  no  less  valuable  because  rendered  by  one 
on  the  inside  of  the  family  group.  The  housewife  and 
mother  toils  week  after  week  at  indispensable  tasks ;  her 
services  constitute  a  large  portion  of  the  real  income  of  the 
family.  She  often  takes  the  least  from  the  income.  Her 
toil  and  her  sacrifices  do  much  to  create  the  "advantages  of 
household  economy."  Why  should  those  benefits  not  accrue 
to  the  family  group,  whose  cooperation  made  them  possible  ? 
Why  should  a  part  of  them  be  transferred  to  employers? 


^F.  W.  Taussig:  "Minimum  Wages  for  Women,"  Quarterly  Journal 
of  Economics,  May  1916,  pages  411-442. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  361 

Why  should  employers  of  the  daughter  get  the  benefits  of 
the  services  which  mothers  render  without  pay  to  their 
daughters  ?  Why  should  not  the  daughters  for  whom  the 
services  were  rendered  receive  the  advantage?  Or  why 
should  they  not  be  able  to  lighten  the  burdens  of  the  mothers 
and  add  to  the  fullness  of  their  lives  by  paying  something 
for  the  services? 

Mrs.  Douglas  estimates  that  the  advantage  to  the  young 
woman  who  lives  at  home  by  reason  of  her  sharing  the  ben- 
efits of  the  household,  amounts  to  about  $1.25  per  week.^ 
But  it  is  pointed  out  that  most  of  the  low  paid  women  come 
from  very  poor  families.  That  the  family  in  many  in- 
stances is  submerged  and  has  a  standard  of  living  below  what 
is  required  for  good  health.  In  such  cases  the  girls  would 
likely  have  to  spend  the  $1.25  saved  by  living  at  home,  for 
food  to  supplement  the  home  diet.  Those  families  most 
need  extra  income  to  enable  them  to  live  decently.  Then 
thrift  might  be  preached  to  them  if  they  could  by  reaping 
for  themselves  the  advantages  of  household  economy  in- 
crease the  margin  from  which  savings  might  be  made. 

3.  Again  there  is  the  theory  that  while  a  woman  is 
working  away  from  home,  she  should  receive  enough  to 
support  her  away  from  home.  That  regardless  of  where  or 
with  whom  she  lives,  she  should  receive  enough  for  her 
work  to  support  her  if  she  should  chose  or  find  it  necessary 
to  live  alone.  This  is  the  temporary  dependence  theory. 
This  is  the  theory  held  by  most  of  those  who  have  to  do 
with  fixing  minimum  wages.  The  necessity  for  a  woman's 
taking  gainful  employment  is  in  most  cases  temporary. 
The  majority  of  such  women  do  eventually  marry.  This 
theory  is  that  while  a  woman  is  at  work  she  should  receive 
enough  to  support  her  independently  of  aid  which  might  be 
extended  by  her  family,  by  subsidized  boarding  or  lodging 
houses,  or  any  form  of  charity. 

4.  Another  group  claims  that  the  standard  woman,  for 
whom  a  proper  living  should  be  provided  from  the  minimum 
wages  paid,  is  the  one  who  is  permanently  dependent  upon 


^Quarterly  Journal  of  Economics,  Feb.  1920,  p.  246. 


362      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

her  individual  efforts.  That  she  must  receive  enough  not 
only  to  keep  her  from  day  to  day,  but  to  sustain  her  in 
long  illness,  and  in  old  age  after  her  usefulness  as  an  em- 
ployee has  practically  vanished.  The  objection  to  this  is 
that  the  minimum  guaranteed  by  law  might  be  regarded  as 
adequate,  and  incentive  to  self  improvement  in  order  to  in- 
crease one's  productivity  and  usefulness  would  be  destroyed, 
or  not  sufficiently  stimulated.  The  minimum  wage  should 
not  be  the  standard  wage,  nor  should  it  be  regarded  as  suf- 
ficient in  itself.  The  state  in  prescribing  such  wages  has  in 
view  the  health  and  welfare  of  the  worker  who  is  employed 
while  employed.  It  is  to  be  expected  that  workers  will  try 
to  deserve  promotion  above  the  minimum,  and  from  in- 
creased earnings  provide  for  the  needs  of  those  permanently 
dependent  upon  their  own  efforts. 

5.  Others  go  so  far  as  to  urge  that  the  minimum  wage 
should  enable  a  woman  to  support  herself  and  a  family. 
This  theory  does  not  seem  to  be  socially  or  economically  de- 
fensible. Socially  it  is  better  for  the  burden  of  support  to 
be  upon  the  husband  and  father.  The  mother  has  enough 
to  do  to  train  and  look  after  the  growing  children.  If  she 
lose  her  husband,  then  instead  of  sending  her  to  work  at 
high  wages,  it  would  be  better  to  give  her  a  pension  out- 
right during  the  years  she  would  be  required  to  devote  to 
her  children.  The  ordinary  woman  has  no  dependents, 
and  the  state  is  using  the  police  power  to  protect  her  during 
the  first  years  of  her  employment,  it  being  assumed  that  if 
she  continues  to  be  employed  that  she  may  get  to  where 
she  can  command  more  than  a  mere  living.  It  is  assumed 
that  having  a  living  assured,  the  women  will  by  their  own 
initiative  and  development,  and  by  cooperating  among  them- 
selves, improve  their  condition  and  advance  their  interests. 
A  minimum  wage  does  not  interfere  with  the  promotion  of 
the  exceptional  woman.  It  will  in  no  way  interfere  with 
the  struggle  of  women  for  better  wages,  hours  and  working 
conditions.  It  merely  protects  the  helpless.  It  is  designed 
to  keep  hard  pressed  or  greedy  employers  from  taking  ad- 
vantage of  the  ignorance,  or  helplessness  of  normal  adult 
w?men.    But  for  the  state  to  step  in  and  say  that  the  min- 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  363 

imum  wage  must  be  sufficient  to  support  a  widow  with  a 
large  family  of  children,  would  be  to  legislate  most  women, 
widows  included,  out  of  employment.  It  would  be  in  effect 
turning  the  whole  matter  of  fixing  wages  over  to  the  state, 
and  leaving  little  to  the  judgment  of  the  contracting  parties. 
Taking  as  the  standard  woman  for  whom  a  wage  must 
provide  a  living,  the  one  who  is  working  away  from  home, 
who  has  no  dependents,  and  who  must  be  sustained  during 
the  period  of  her  employment,  the  question  arises  what 
would  constitute  for  her  a  proper  living?  This  problem  has 
been  attacked  by  wage  boards  and  by  investigators  in  dif- 
ferent parts  of  the  country.  The  usual  method  has  been  to 
make  out  a  minimum  budget  for  a  single  woman  living 
alone. 

The  following  budget  was  submitted  by  representatives 
of  the  public  in  the  District  of  Columbia : 

EXPENSES 

Clothing     $  4.11 

Board  and  Room 9.00 

Sundries: 

Laundry 1.00 

Sickness 35 

Dentistry     14 

Oculist    07 

Amusements   18 

Vacation    25 

Savings  and  Insurance 50 

Charity    03 

Religion 09 

Labor  Organization , .       .08 

Other   Organization    05 

School    Tuition    03 

Car  fare  to  and  from  work 60 

Other  car   fare 25 

Books   and   magazines 07 

Other  incidentals    35 

Total  per  week $17.15 


364      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

The  Industrial  Welfare  Commission  of  California  on 
April  22,  1919,  fixed  a  minimum  wage  in  mercantile  indus- 
tries of  $13.50  a  week,  and  on  May  12,  1919,  in  the  fruit 
and  vegetable  canning  industry  a  piece  rate  scale  that  will 
yield  not  less  than  $13.50  per  week.  These  orders  of  the 
California  Commission  were  based  upon  the  following 
budget:^ 

Board  and  Room $429.00 


Shoes   (3)    $18.00 

Corsets    (2)    7.00 

Petticoats   (3)    6.50 

Stockings    (12)    6.50 

Nightgowns   (3)    4.50 

Underwear    10.50 

Dresses    20.00 

Coat   24.00 

Suit    33.00 

Sweater     4.50 

Hats 15.00 

Gloves   (2) 4.50 

Handkerchiefs    2.00 

Kimona    2.00 

Waists  (4)    10.50 

Umbrella 1.50 

Rubbers     75 


Clothing    ..  170.75 


Toilet  articles 15.00 

Medical  and  dental 25.00 

Vacation  and  Amusement 20.00 

Laundry    15.00 

Car  fare. 31.20 


Sundries    . .   106.20 


Total $705.95  for    year 

Total 13.57  for  week 


iRatherine  Philips  Edson:     Leaflet,  "A  Study  of  the  Cost  of  Liv- 
ing." 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice 


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366      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Qimrterly 


The  following  budget  was  prepared  by  Mrs.  Dorothy  W. 
Douglas  of  the  University  of  Washington:^ 


FULL  "TEMPORARY  INDEPENDENCE"  BUDGET 
Minimum  Weekly   Rates 

Boarding  At  Home 

Room,   board,   lunches,    and  Daughter's    share    of    house- 
partial  laundry   $9.05        keeping    expenses,    plus 

mother's  services  $7.80 

Daughter's  subsidy  to  family.   1.25 

J  Total $9.05 

Clothing   ($130.00  a  year) $  2.50 

Toilet  articles,  soap,  etc.,  ($5.20  a  year) 10 

Car  fare  (10  cents  a  day) 60 

Health    ($21.00  a  year) 40 

Stamps  and  Stationery  (25  cents  a  month) 06 

Amusements'  (movies,  ice  cream,  etc.) 35 

Net  Cost  of  vacation 15 

Education  (papers  and  magazines) 15 

Extra  car  fare  (10  cents  every  two  weeks) 05 

Dues   05 

Church  and  charity 15 

Christmas  presents  ($3.65  a  year  excess  over  presents  received)       .07 

Insurance  ($13.00  a  year) 25 

Other  expenses    (unforeseen) 07 

Loss  of  wages  (one  week's  illness  $15.00) 30 

Loss  of  wages  (one  week's  vacation  or  unemployment) 30 

Savings  ($21.00  ayear)    40 

Total $15.00 


^Quarterly  Journal  of  Economics,  Feb.  1920,  p.  258. 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice 


367 


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368      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

From  the  above  studies  a  fair  estimate  may  be  made  of 
what  is  required  to  support  in  minimum  comfort  the  single 
woman. 

V.      • 

The  Industrial  Welfare  Commission  of  Texas  organized 
as  soon  as  the  law  became  effective.  It  decided  to  hold  ses- 
sions on  two  afternoons  of  each  month.  Investigators  were 
employed  and  instructed  to  secure  payrolls  of  employers  in 
mercantile  and  manufacturing  establishments,  in  laundries, 
telegraph  and  telephone  exchanges.  They  were  also  re- 
quired to  find  the  cost  of  living  of  women  and  children  em- 
ployed in  these  four  classes  of  business.  The  payrolls  were 
sworn  to  by  the  accountants  of  the  employing  establishments 
under  investigation.  The  commission  was  able  to  find  out 
what  women  and  children  were  being  paid.  They  asked  the 
employees  to  estimate  what  it  cost  them  to  live  each  year. 
This  part  of  the  investigation  did  not  bring  together  well 
established  facts,  but  rather  a  series  of  best  guesses.  One 
must  feel  that  these  estimates  were  often  too  large  or  too 
small  according  to  the  limitations  of  the  person  seeking 
without  memoranda  to  recall  the  increasing  expenditure  for 
one  entire  year.  The  budget  submitted  by  the  investigators 
was  not  adequate,  and  failed  to  remind  the  employees  of 
many  items  which  would  properly  appear  in  a  minimum 
budget.  Very  few  were  found  who  kept  an  account  of  per- 
sonal expenses.  The  table  submitted  above  as  prepared  by 
the  investigators  for  the  Welfare  Commission  is  not  the  re- 
sult of  a  scientific  study  of  living  expenses.  Knowing  these 
facts  as  to  the  method  of  its  compilation,  one  must  decide 
for  oneself  how  valuable  it  is. 

Beginning  in  October  the  Commission  held  a  series  of 
public  hearings  from  time  to  time  in  Houston,  Waco,  San 
Antonio,  Tyler,  Dallas,  El  Paso,  and  Austin.  The  hearings 
were  informal.  Usually  one  day  was  given  to  employees, 
one  to  employers,  and  one  to  any  of  the  public  who  might  be 
interested,  as  social  workers.  The  employees  as  a  rule  had 
no  spokesman.    The  investigators  would  bring  them  in,  or 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  369 

employers  would  send  them.  They  were  asked  such  ques- 
tions as  how  much  they  earned,  how  much  was  required  for 
them  to  live,  sometimes  being  asked  to  specify  expenditures 
by  item.  On  the  whole  not  much  was  brought  out  in  the 
public  examination  of  employees  which. had  not  been  gath- 
ered by  the  investigators. 

The  employers  usually  had  a  spokesman,  often  one  of  the 
local  business  men.  They  would  present  briefs  calculated  to 
show  what  it  cost  to  live  in  the  locality,  or  how  much  the 
business  had  to  meet  in  the  way  of  outside  competition.  As 
a  rule  not  much  was  learned  from  them.  But  their  pleas  got 
into  the  papers  and  were  more  convincing  reading  than  the 
haphazard  statements  made  by  miscellaneous  employees. 
The  social  workers  were  usually  matrons  of  subsidized 
rooming  houses,  such  as  the  Y.  W.  C.  A.,  police  matrons,  or 
teachers.  Their  testimony  showed  something  of  the  num- 
ber of  delinquent  girls  and  opinions  of  those  dealing  with 
them  as  to  the  causes  of  their  lapses.  Such  testimony  was 
worth  little  to  the  Commission  in  making  up  an  opinion  as 
to  what  a  minimum  wage  should  be. 

These  hearings  were  supposed  to  attract  the  attention  of 
the  public  to  the  need  for  a  legal  minimum  wage.  The  em- 
ployers, however,  made  better  use  of  the  opportunities  for 
moulding  public  opinion  than  did  the  Commission.  Without 
appearing  to  oppose  the  law,  or  the  principle  of  the  min- 
imum wage,  they  were  able  to  convince  the  public  that  the 
present  law  is  unworkable. 

The  Attorney  General  ruled  that  the  Commission  may  not 
under  the  law  divide  the  state  into  zones,  but  that  a  min- 
imum wage  announced  for  an  industry  must  apply  to  all  in 
that  industry  throughout  the  state.  The  employers  took  the 
position  that  a  wage  adequate  in  a  small  town  would  be  in- 
adequate in  a  city,  and  that  a  minimum  high  enough  for  the 
city  dweller  would  be  ruinous  to  industry  and  commerce  in 
a  small  town.  They  submitted  very  little  evidence  to  sup- 
port their  position,  but  they  did  not  need  to  go  that  trouble. 
In  fact  the  Commission  did  not  insist  upon  evidence,  but 
listened  to  lawyers  argue  the  general  proposition.  The 
press  took  up  their  plausible  theory,  and  editorials  appeared 


370      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

in  its  support.  Members  of  the  legislature,  especially  of  the 
state  senate,  were  appealed  to  by  employers  for  fair  treat- 
ment, and  they  too  in  the  absence  of  arguments  to  the  con- 
trary subscribed  to  the  employers'  proposition  that  the  law 
is  impracticable  and, a  majority  of  them  signed  a  petition  to 
the  Commission  to  defer  action  until  the  legislature  could 
meet  and  correct  the  law.  At  a  special  session  of  the  Legis- 
lature in  June,  1920,  a  joint  resolution  was  passed  asking  the 
Commission  not  to  act  under  the  present  law. 

In  the  meantime  the  Commission  had  assembled  payrolls 
from  all  parts  of  the  state.  They  found  that  women  in  small 
towns  are  better  paid  than  in  cities,  though  employers  had 
been  arguing  that  the  cost  of  living  is  so  much  more  in  a 
city  that  wages  there  have  to  be  so  high  as  to  be  well  nigh 
prohibitive  to  the  small  town  business  man.  There  is  noth- 
ing surprising  in  the  fact  that  better  wages  are  paid  in  the 
smaller  places.  In  a  town  the  employer  knows  personally 
his  employees.  He  and  their  families  are  acquaintances, 
perhaps  friends.  Out  of  personal  relationship  a  better  wage 
develops. 

In  the  city  the  employer  does  not,  in  many  instances, 
know  his  employees.  He  deals  with  them  impersonally 
through  a  labor  manager  who  is  supposed  to  get  them  for 
as  little  as  possible.  Consequently  wages  are  beaten  down 
in  the  cities,  where  cost  of  living  is  higher,  below  what  is 
paid  in  the  smaller  places,  where  it  does  not  cost  so  much 
to  live.  But  the  Commission  did  not  get  this  information 
across  to  the  people.  In  fact  the  majority  of  the  employers 
interested  do  not  know  these  facts,  but  accept  in  the  absence 
of  better  information  the  general  proposition  upon  which 
the  purposes  of  the  law  have  thus  far  been  defeated. 

However,  the  Commission  is  not  to  be  censured.  If  it  has 
appeared  timid  and  slow,  this  has  been  due  to  the  fact  that 
the  law  conscripted  the  commissioners.  They  are  ex  officio 
members.  They  are  busy  with  the  duties  of  their  other 
offices.  Their  primary  interests  are  in  the  work  of  their 
particular  offices.  Without  any  further  remuneration  they 
were  required  to  take  on  this  extra  responsibility.  Then  the 
law  imposed  upon  them  the  burden  of  finding  and  of  fixing 


Minimum  Wage  Theory  and  Practice  371 

all  the  minimum  wage  rates  in  the  different  occupations. 
No  subsidiary  boards  were  provided,  such  as  function  in 
Massachusetts.  The  task  is  great  enough  to  require  a  sep- 
arate commission  appointed  and  paid  for  their  separate 
work.  Then  they  should  have  authority  to  appoint  wage 
boards  for  different  industries  in  different  parts  of  the 
state. 

The  Commission  on  November  20,  1920,  ordered  a  min- 
imum wage  of  $12.00  for  a  w^ek  of  forty-eight  hours,  ef- 
fective February  7,  1921.  On  January  31,  1921,  at  the  re- 
quest of  a  joint  committee  of  the  Legislature,  the  time  for 
the  order  to  become  effective  was  postponed  until  March  14, 
1921.  This  was  to  give  the  Legislature  an  opportunity  to 
amend  the  law.^ 


^The  legislature  passed  two  bills,  one  repealing  the  existing  law, 
the  other  providing  a  new  minimum  wage  law.  On  March  30  the 
Governor  signed  the  bill  repealing  the  existing  law,  and  vetoed  the 
bill  providing  a  new  law.  This  leaves  Texas  without  a  minimum  wage 
law.  In  the  next  number  of  the  Quarterly  a  note  will  review  what  the 
legislature  did  and  set  out  the  Governor's  reason  for  vetoing  the  bill 
which  was  designed  as  a  substitute  for  the  law  that  was  repealed. 


THE  RELATION  OF  ECONOMICS  TO  HISTORY 

C.  D.  JOHNS 

Baylor  College 

Traditional  divisions  of  scientific  fields,  some  one  has  said, 
are  as  hard  to  get  rid  of  as  boundaries  on  a  map.  For  ex- 
ample, we  still  have  seven  liberal  arts;  though  as  a  matter 
of  fact  the  number  might  be  multiplied  five  or  six  fold  and 
still  leave  several  subjects  unaccounted  for.  In  this  day  of 
specialization  and  v^ith  an  ever  increasing  mass  of  fact,  such 
divisions  are  more  or  less  necessary  for  purposes  of  scien- 
tific treatment.  But  while  we  may  recognize  the  specialist's 
method  of  work  as  essential,  it  is  quite  another  thing  to  re- 
gard him  as  having  a  monopoly  of  the  phenomena  with 
which  he  works.  This  point  has  been  so  well  maintained  by 
our  sociologists  in  recent  years  that  few  will  challenge  it; 
certainly  not  in  so  far  as  it  applies  to  the  so-called  social 
sciences. 

The  scope  of  history  until  quite  recently  has  undoubtedly 
been  too  narrowly  limited.  The  so-called  "drum  and  trum- 
pet'* history  and  the  mere  narration  of  political  events  oc- 
cupied a  place  in  our  histories  to  the  exclusion  of  most  all 
else.  In  the  last  generation,  however,  there  has  grown  up 
in  this  country  and  in  Europe  a  group  of  historians  like 
Turner,  Shotwell,  Hayes,  Hodder,  Dodd,  Becker,  Beard,  and 
others  who  have  done  much  in  their  seminars  and  in  their 
writings  to  emphasize  the  importance  of  social  and  economic 
factors  in  history.  Nevertheless,  Freeman's  famous  motto 
"History  is  past  politics  and  politics  present  history"  might 
still  be  written  across  the  title  page  of  many  of  our  his- 
tories ;  and  far  too  many  of  our  historians  and  teachers  still 
measure  off  man's  past  with  the  yardstick  of  dynasties  and 
fill  their  pages  and  recitation  periods  with  wars  and  rumors 
of  wars  and  with  the  dry  chronicling  of  the  political  issues 
of  Whigs  and  Tories,  Republicans  and  Democrats,  and  give 
but  slight  attention  to  the  economic  and  social  conditions 
which  made  these  issues  potent. 


The  Relation  of  Economics  to  History  373 

Until  recently  the  social  and  economic  field  has  been  left 
to  others,  largely  to  the  economists.  And  it  was  for  this 
reason  that  the  importance  of  such  an  event  as  the  Indus- 
trial Revolution  was  so  long  unseen  by  the  historian.  It 
was  an  economist,  Arnold  Toynbee,  who  first  pointed  out 
the  historical  significance  of  this  great  movement  and  placed 
it  in  proper  historical  perspective.  But  his  treament  left 
much  to  be  desired,  and  it  is  really  only  in  the  last  decade 
that  this  revolution  which  Professor  Shotwell  declares 
was  the  greatest  event  in  the  world's  history^  has  received 
anything  like  its  proper  share  of  space  in  our  histories  at 
the  hands  of  historians.  Cunningham,  to  be  sure,  had  treated 
the  period  at  some  length  in  his  great  work  on  English  In- 
dustry and  Commerce  but  he  was  interested  mainly  in  doc- 
trines and  in  substantiating  theories  on  mercantilism  and 
the  laissez-faire  system  rather  than  in  the  facts  themselves. 
But  economic  facts  do  not  exist  merely  to  substantiate  doc- 
trines or  to  derive  laws  of  consumption  or  theories  of  value. 
They  are  also  the  dynamic  forces  of  history  and  set  in  mo- 
tion great  movements  that  affect  the  very  course  of  civiliza- 
tion itself.  No  fact  or  event  stands  by  itself  alone,  nor  can 
one  separate  the  environment  and  forces  of  life  into  exclu- 
sive compartments.  And  the  specialists  who  deal  with  one 
thing  at  a  time  to  the  exclusion  of  everything  else  are  deal- 
ing with  mere  abstractions  which  have  never  existed  any- 
where outside  their  own  mind. 

What  relation  then  has  economics  to  history?  Let  us 
keep  in  mind  in  the  discussion  of  this  question  that  neither 
of  these  subjects  is  necessarily  subordinate  to  the  other. 
It  is  our  purpose  rather  to  see  how  they  can  be  made  mu- 
tually helpful  and  how  one  may  be  drawn  on  to  supplenient 
the  other.  That  many  historical  movements  such  for  ex- 
ample as  the  French  Revolution  or  the  more  recent  Great 
War  are  closely  associated  with  economic  conditions,  and 
that  on  the  other  hand  many  economic  principles  or  theories 
can  be  best  understood  only  when  viewed  from  the  his- 


ij.   T.    Shotwell,  "Social   History  and   the   Industrial   Revolution," 
Repts.  Assn.  Hist.  Teachers  of  Middle  States  and  Md.     1911,  p.  6. 


374      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

torical  standpoint,  no  one  will  deny.  It  is.  with  this  phase 
of  the  question  rather  than  any  deeper  discussion  of  the 
interdependence  of  these  two  subjects  that  teachers  are 
mostly  interested. 

It  can  readily  be  seen  that  the  teaching  of  history  fur- 
nishes many  opportunities  for  the  introduction  of  economic 
material  and  much  has  been  said  and  written  in  recent  years 
about  the  so-called  economic  interpretation  of  history. 
While  this  point  of  view  is  very  helpful  and  illuminating, 
we  must  constantly  be  on  our  guard  however  lest  in  em- 
phasizing the  economic  side  the  other  phases  may  be  over- 
looked. This  brings  to  mind  an  article  by  Professor  Cham- 
berlain of  the  Geology  Department  of  the  University  of 
Chicago  which  appeared  some  years  ago  entitled  "A  Mul- 
tiple Working  Hypothesis."  The  main  point  emphasized 
in  this  article,  which  Professor  Turner  always  urged  his 
seminar  students  to  read,  was  the  danger  in  attempting 
to  explain  any  event  by  any  one  particular  cause,  or  in  be- 
coming the  champion  of  any  particular  theory.  For  the 
moment  we  adopt  a  theory  we  become  a  father  to  it,  pet  it 
and  humor  it,  and  are  blind  to  its  faults  and  strong  in  its 
defense.  Someone  criticizing  the  emphasis  that  has  been 
placed  on  the  influence  of  geography  in  history  in  recent 
years  has  said  "that  when  England  has  become  a  memory 
and  Holland  a  myth,  the  advocates  of  geographical  environ- 
ment will  find  in  the  rocks  and  the  chilling  mists  of  New 
England  the  forces  that  created  the  Puritan  conscience  and 
dwarfed  his  emotion."^  So  then  the  use  either  of  economics 
or  geography  in  interpreting  history  must  be  balanced  with 
some  common  sense.  For  historical  movements  are  so  nu- 
merous and  complex  and  the  material  at  hand  lends  itself 
so  readily  to  preconceived  economic  theories  that  false  his- 
torical perspective  and  distorted  views  of  history  may  easily 
result.  On  the  other  hand  it  can  not  be  doubted  that  one 
set  of  causes  is  economic  just  as  another  set  is  personal  or 
psychological.  That  the  economic  set  is  the  chief  or  the 
only  set  may  reasonably  be  doubted  but  that  it  is  a  set  must . 


^E.   D.  Adams,   The  Power  of  Ideals   in  American  History,   p.   x. 


The  Relation  of  Economics  to  History  375 

be  admitted.  Who  for  example  can  say  just  what  caused 
the  overthrow  of  Napoleon?  We  can  be  quite  sure,  how- 
ever, that  it  was  not  the  hollow  squares  of  Waterloo  as  much 
as  it  was  the  Continental  System  and  the  thousand  million 
"iron  slaves"  which  Robert  Owen  estimated  the  Industrial 
Revolution  had  set  to  work  in  the  English  mills  at  Manches- 
ter and  Birmingham  by  the  end  of  the  Napoleonic  wars.^ 
Again,  who  would  attempt  to  explain  the  recent  defeat  of 
the  Germans  without  going  into  the  economic  causes  which 
made  her  defeat  possible?  Yet  who  would  leave  out  of  ac- 
count the  generalship  of  Marshal  Foch,  or  the  stirring  notes 
of  President  Wilson  that  fought  like  vast  armies  on  the  side 
of  the  allies  in  breaking  down  the  morale  of  the  German 
people  ? 

A  tjTJical  illustration  of  the  close  association  of  histor- 
ical events  with  economic  conditions  is  furnished  us  in  the 
great  English  reform  bills  of  the  nineteenth  century.  The 
necessity  and  the  growing  demand  for  reform  in  the  system 
of  parliamentary  representation  becomes  much  more  sig- 
nificant when  we  consider  the  economic  changes  which  had 
shifted  the  population  from  the  south  and  east  to  the  north 
and  west  and  from  the  rural  to  urban  localities.  The  In- 
dustrial Revolution  had  given  rise  to  mining  and  industrial 
centers  at  the  north  and  in  addition  to  making  the  old  sys- 
tem of  representation  all  the  more  unequal  gave  rise  to  a 
new  class  of  capitalists  that  demanded  a  place  in  the  affairs 
of  the  government  alongside  that  of  the  old  landholding 
aristocracy.  Land  ceased  to  be  the  dominant  force  in  Eng- 
lish society  in  the  nineteenth  century.  The  manufacturers 
and  finally  the  laborers  came  into  possession  of  political 
rights  formerly  reserved  for  the  landed  aristocracy,  and  a 
new  industrial  order  replaced  the  old  regime.  This  is  the 
meaning  of  the  great  measures  of  1832,  1867,  1884-5,  1911, 
and  1918.  The  repeal  of  the  corn  laws  in  1846  illustrates 
again  that  the  interests  of  the  industrial  elements  were  com- 
ing to  take  precedence  over  those  of  the  landholding  elements 
in  society.     One  need  only  mention  the  great  body  of  social 


^See  American  Ristorical  Review,  XVIII,  pp.  692-3. 


376      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

and  economic  legislation  in  England  in  the  last  century  to 
show  the  working  of  economic  forces  there. 

The  same  forces  may  be  seen  at  work  in  the  history  of 
other  countries.  The  French  Revolution  comes  at  once  to 
mind.  One  can  not  grasp  the  meaning  of  this  great  struggle 
or  understand  its  significance  without  a  knowledge  of  the 
intolerable  condition  of  the  peasantry,  the  unjust  and  un- 
equal system  of  taxation,  industrial  restrictions,  poor  meth- 
ods of  agriculture,  high  prices  of  food,  and  unsound  finan- 
cial policies.  All  of  these  are  economic  factors  of  prime 
importance. 

Turning  now  to  American  history,  the  play  of  economic 
forces  is  perhaps  here  even  more  clearly  seen.  Professor 
Beard  and  Doctor  Libby  have  shown  the  economic  forces 
back  of  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution ;  and  how  the  Fed- 
eralists were  mainly  men  with  business  interests  to  protect 
and  encourage  and  with  money  to  loan,  while  their  oppo- 
nents were  mostly  among  the  farming  and  debtor  classes 
many  of  whom  had  borrowed  "cheap  money"  to  fit  them- 
selves out  in  a  "new  clearing."  It  was  but  natural  that 
the  former  should  be  interested  in  a  strong  government 
capable  of  protecting  property,  in  a  sound  financial  sys- 
tem, and  in  commercial  treaties  with  England.  It  was 
equally  natural  that  the  latter  should  look  with  jealousy  on 
as  strong  government  as  copying  England  and  admire  the 
liberty  and  equality  of  the  French.  Again  one  can  not  un- 
derstand the  importance  of  New  Orleans  in  1800  unless 
one  remembers  that  it  was  in  the  days  before  railroads  and 
that  the  Mississippi  was  the  highway  over  which  the  pro- 
duce of  the  settlers  beyond  the  mountains  reached  the  mar- 
ket. Or,  to  take  another  example,  how  can  one  explain  the 
change  of  Daniel  Webster  from  a  strong  opponent  of  pro- 
tection in  1816  and  1820  to  one  of  its  champions  in  1824 
and  1828  without  taking  into  account  the  economic  changes 
brought  about  by  the  embargo  and  the  war  which  had 
shifted  the  capital  of  his  constituency  from  commerce  to 
manufacturing?  And  certainly  it  was  not  merely  to  be  on 
opposite  sides  that  Calhoun,  the  great  nationalist  of  1816, 
had  become  the  great  nullifier  of  1828.     It  was  rather  that. 


The  Relation  of  Economics  to  History  Zll 

the  invasion  of  his  up-country  district  by  the  advancing 
cotton  plantation  forced  him  to  choose  between  his  nation- 
alism and  his  position  as  leader  of  the  South.  The  inven- 
tion of  the  cotton  gin  making  the  growing  of  short  staple 
cotton  profitable  had  worked  a  revolution  in  the  Old  South 
by  1830,  swung  it  away  from  its  almost  solid  protectionist 
position  of  1816,  identified  its  interests  definitely  with  agri- 
culture, and  made  it  the  champion  of  slavery.  And  in  the 
long  struggle  that  followed  it  was  not  simply  a  question  of 
the  constitutional  right  of  slavery  in  the  territories,  but 
which  side  should  control  the  government  in  its  own  interest 
and  who  should  pay  the  taxes.  Similarly  the  key  to  the  un- 
derstanding of  recent  American  history  is  to  be  found  in 
the  economic  revolution  that  took  place  in  this  country  in 
the  decades  following  the  Civil  War.  There  was  a  revolu- 
tion in  transportation,  agriculture  and  agricultural  meth- 
ods, and  in  manufacturing  processes  that  has  transformed 
the  United  States  into  a  leading  industrial  state  in  the  mod- 
ern world  with  a  foreign  trade  reaching  into  every  quarter 
of  the  globe.  It  is  this  also  that  has  so  affected  our  tradi- 
tional policy  of  isolation.  "It  is  to  this  new  economic  basis 
of  American  life,"  says  Professor  Schlesinger,  "that  the  his- 
torian must  ascribe  the  characteristic  events  of  recent  his- 
tory— ^the  new  issues,  the  changed  character  of  parties,  the 
growing  conflict  between  capital  and  labor,  modern  social 
questions,  indeed  our  very  intellectual  and  cultural  ideals 
and  habits."^ 

It  is  impossible  for  lack  of  time  to  do  more  than  mention 
other  cases  in  point.  Such  for  example  as  the  extent  to 
which  the  backwardness  of  the  South  in  the  ante-bellum 
days  was  due  to  the  fact  that  it  was  starved  for  investment 
capital  by  tying  up  all  its  savings  in  lands  and  slaves ;  the 
influence  of  the  free  lands  in  the  West  on  wages  in  the  East 
and  on  the  character  and  ideals  of  the  people;  the  effects 
of  our  extreme  individualism  and  laissez-faire  policy  in  re- 
gard to  our  national  resources,  and  the  extent  to  which  such 


lA.  M.  Schlesinger,  "Problem  of  Teaching  Recent  Americin  His- 
tory."    Historical  Outlook   (December,  1920).     Vol.  II.,  p.  353. 


378      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

a  policy  has  been  responsible  for  great  inequalities  in  the 
distribution  of  wealth  and  other  great  social  and  economic 
problems  of  today.  The  mere  mention  of  them  shows  how 
vastly  important  have  been  the  economic  forces  in  our  his- 
tory. 

The  relation  between  economic  factors  and  intellectual 
movements  might  also  be  pointed  out  by  indicating  the  con- 
nection between  cultural  epochs  and  a  social  surplus.  For 
example  the  relation  between  slavery  and  the  intellectual 
advance  made  possible  by  the  existence  of  a  leisure  class  in 
ancient  Greece ;  or  the  relation  of  the  Renaissance  to  the  rise 
of  commerce  and  the  growth  of  great  centers  of  wealth  in 
Italy.  Or,  to  take  a  more  recent  example,  who  can  estimate 
the  influence  for  progress  that  resulted  from  the  Industrial 
Revolution  which  Professor  Shotwell  estimated  some  years 
ago  had  brought  into  existence  in  the  textile  trades  alone  a 
non-human  working  population  equalling  considerably  more 
than  (50,000,000,000)  fifty  billion  men!  The  wage  earners 
no  longer  do  this  w^ork  themselves  with  spinning  wheel  and 
loom,  but  have  become  the  overseers  of  a  vast  gang  of  slaves 
and  their  duty  is  not  to  do  the  work  but  to  make  them  do  it ! 

Turning  now  once  more  to  political  movements,  we  can 
see  that  the  modern  struggle  for  world  power,  is  but  a  strug- 
gle for  economic  supremacy,  and  modern  war  but  the  climax 
of  industrial  competition.  Empire  once  meant  territorial 
expansion,  today  it  means  markets.  Take  the  history  of 
Germany  for  example.  It  was  a  grand  plan  Bismarck  con- 
ceived to  make  Germany  great:  To  be  great  she  must  be 
populous;  to  support  a  vast  population  Germany  must  es- 
tablish industries  in  order  to  furnish  her  population  a  means 
of  livelihood ;  if  Germany  was  to  become  an  industrial  coun- 
try she  must  have  markets  for  her  surplus,  and  a  source  of 
supply  of  raw  materials;  therefore  colonies;  and  hence  a 
navy  to  protect  and  extend  her  trade.  Here  her  ambitions 
conflicted  with  those  of  her  neighbors.  Germany  wanted  a 
place  in  the  sun,  but  the  sun  was  now  too  high,  and  those 
who  had  come  at  the  first  hour  were  unwilling  that  those 
who  came  at  the  eleventh  hour  should  receive  the  same  rec- 
ompen::e.     If  Bismarck  foresaw  this  he  did  not  hesitate; 


The  Relation  of  Economics  to  History  379 

blood  and  iron  had  united  Germany,  and  blood  and  iron 
would  make  her  great. 

Such  then  is  the  process  of  interpreting  history  in  the 
light  of  economic  facts.  And  it  is  in  this  way  that  the 
study  of  economics  may  be  made  to  supplement  the  study 
of  history  and  to  make  its  teaching  both  clearer  and  more 
interesting  to  the  student. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  economist  might  point  out  at  equal 
length  the  various  ways  in  which  history  may  be  made  help- 
ful in  the  study  of  economics.  This  is  particularly  true  in 
the  teaching  of  elementary  economics  where  abstract  facts 
may  be  made  to  stand  out  in  concrete  form  by  the  use  of 
historical  material  for  illustration.  But  history  is  of  value 
to  economics  not  merely  for  purposes  of  illustration  but 
also  for  the  purpose  of  qualifying  conclusions  and  for  point- 
ing out  the  limits  of  economic  doctrines.  The  doctrine  of 
Friedrich  List,  for  example,  that  all  civilized  states  of  the 
temperate  zone  pass  through  successive  economic  stages 
and  that  their  attitude  at  any  time  towards  protection  or 
free  trade  depends  on  the  stage  of  development  that  has 
been  reached;^  history  must  be  relied  upon  to  illus- 
trate and  also  to  test  this  principle.  So  also  with  Ricardo's 
theory  of  rent  or  Malthus's  theory  of  population;  history 
shows  that  these  are  subject  to  qualifications  as  to  both  time 
and  place.  Not  only  does  history  test  economic  theories  and 
furnish  illustrative  material  to  the  teacher,  but  it  also  fur- 
nishes material  from  which  economic  laws  may  be  deducted ; 
for  example,  the  effects  of  inventions  and  machinery  on 
wages,  the  evils  of  poor  currency  laws,  the  effect  of  an  in- 
creasing supply  of  money  on  trade  and  industry,  to  mention 
but  a  few  instances.  So  then  in  the  teaching  of  economics 
history  must  be  constantly  appealed  to. 

The  two  subjects  then  are  mutually  helpful  and  their  cor- 
relation in  the  class  room  will  lead  to  more  suggestive  and 
profitable  teaching  by  the.  instructor  and  make  the  class 
much  more  interesting  to  the  student.  Little  is  to  be  gained 
therefore  in  attempting  to  restrict  the  subject  matter  of 
either  within  too  narrow  limits. 


ij.  N.  Keynes,  -Scope  and  Method  of  Economics,  pp.  298-99. 


DIVISION  OF  LATIN  AMERICAN  AFFAIRS^ 
HERMAN  G.  JAMES,  ASSOCIATE  EDITOR 

THE  EXECUTIVE  OFFICE  IN  THE  LATIN- 
AMERICAN  CONSTITUTIONS^ 

ETHEL   M.   CRAMPTON 

Northwestern  University 

Of  the  Latin- American  republics  four  are  federal — Argen- 
tina, Brazil,  Mexico  and  Venezuela ;  the  remaining  thirteen, 
unitary.^  The  majority  describe  their  governments  to  be  in 
form  "republican,  democratic  and  representative"  while 
Venezuela  professes  to  be  "popular,  elective,  federal,  repre- 
sentative, alternative  and  responsible."  As  in  the  Constitu- 
tion of  the  United  States,  the  three  departments  of  govern- 
ment are  recognized,  with  the  bicameral  system  prevailing 
everywhere  except  in  Costa  Rica,  Guatemala,  Honduras, 
Panama  and  Salvador,  which  have  unicameral  legislatures. 

The  chief  executive  in  each  state  is  a  president.  In  the 
Central  American  states,  with  one  exception,  his  title  is 
"President  of  the  Republic";  Costa  Rica  calls  him  "Chief 
of  the  Nation" ;  and  Mexico,  "President  of  the  United  Mexi- 
can States."  He  is  "President  of  the  Argentine  Nation," 
"President  of  the  United  States  of  Brazil,"  and  "President 
of  the  Republic  of  Uruguay" ;  elsewhere,  "President  of  the 
Republic." 

The  qualifications  for  president  are  similar  in  all  the  re- 


1  Owing  to  limitations  of  cpace  the  News  and  Notes  section  will  be 
omitted  in  this  issue  and  postponed  to  the  June  number. 

2lt  will  be  seen  that  the  executive  offices  in  Cuba,  Haiti,  and  the 
Dominican  Republic  are  not  considered  in  this  discussion. — Editor's 
note. 

^Constitutions  used: 
Argentina,    September  15,   1860.     Amended   to   March   15,   1898. 
Bolivia,  October  17,  1880.     Amended  to  November  10,  1888. 
Brazil,  February  24,  1891.     Amended  to  June  26,  1893. 
Chile,  May  25,  1833.     Amended  to  April  27,  1905. 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  381 

publics.  He  must  be  a  native-born  citizen  in  full  exercise 
of  his  political  rights  except  in  Guatemala  and  Nicaragua, 
where  the  president  may  be  a  native  of  any  other  republic 
of  Central  America ;  and  in  Mexico,  where  not  only  he,  but 
his  parents  also,  must  be  native-born.  He  must  be  thirty 
or  thirty-five  years  of  age  everywhere  except  in  Uruguay 
where  the  age  of  thirty-three  is  specified  and  in  Guatemala 
where  the  president  must  be  twenty-one  years  of  age.  In 
Nicaragua  no  age  is  specified.  In  only  four  constitutions 
are  residence  requirements  laid  down  for  the  presidency: 
in  Argentina,  he  must  have  lived  six  years  in  the  republic ; 
in  Bolivia  and  Peru,  five  and  ten  years,  respectively;  and 
in  Mexico,  he  must  have  resided  in  that  country  the  entire 
year  prior  to  the  election.  In  Costa  Rica,  Guatemala,  Mex- 
ico, Nicaragua  and  Salvador  the  president  may  not  belong 
to  the  "ecclesiastical  state" ;  in  Paraguay  he  must  "profess 
the  Christian  religion" ;  and  in  Argentina,  both  president 
and  vice-president  "must  belong  to  the  Roman  Catholic 
Apostolic  Religion."  No  other  countries  prescribe  religious 
qualifications  for  the  presidential  office. 

Six  countries  have  property  qualifications  in  the  form  of 
an  income  requirement  without  specifying,  except  in  the 
case  indicated  below,  the  sources  from  which  the  income 
may  be  derived.  Thus,  he  must  have  an  income  equivalent 
to  $2,200  in  Argentina,  $160  in  Bolivia,  and  $500  in  Chile; 
$2,200  in  Colombia,  derived  from  "property  or  the  pursuit 
of  an  honorable  occupation" ;  $500  in  Costa  Rica,  or  a  yearly 
income  of  200. 


Costa  Rica,  December  7,  1871. 

Ecuador,  January  12,  1897.     Amended  to  November  5,  1887. 

Guatemala,  December  11,  1879. 

Honduras,  September  2,  1904. 

Mevvico,   1917. 

Nicaragua,  March  30,  1905. 

Panama,  February  13,  1904. 

Paraguay,  November  25,  1870. 

Peru,  December,  1919. 

Salvador,  August  13,  1886. 

Uruguay.  November  25.  1917. 

Venezuela,  April  27,  1904. 


382      The  Southtvestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

In  addition  to  the  usual  requirements,  the  president  of 
Costa  Rica  must,  like  an  elector  of  that  country,  "know  how 
to  read  and  write,*'  and  "any  ancestor,  descendant,  or 
brother  by  consanguinity  or  affinity"  is  disqualified  for  the 
presidency.^  In  Salvador,  he  must  be  of  "well-known  hon- 
esty and  learning"  and  "in  full  possession  of  his  rights  of 
citizenship,  without  having  lost  them  in  the  five  years  pre- 
ceding the  election."-  In  Mexico  the  constitution  declares 
that  the  president  "shall  not  have  taken  part,  directly  or  in- 
directly, in  any  uprising,  riot  or  military  coup ;  ...  he  shall 
not  be  a  secretary  or  assistant  secretary  of  any  executive 
department,  unless  he  shall  have  resigned  from  office  ninety 
days  prior  to  the  election ;  ...  he  shall  not  belong  to  the 
^ecclesiastical  state'  nor  be  a  minister  of  any  religious  creed ; 
. . .  and  in  the  event  of  belonging  to  the  army,  he  shall  have 
retired  from  active  service  ninety  days  immediately  prior 
to  the  election."^ 

The  president  is  required  by  all  the  constitutions  except 
that  of  Nicaragua,  to  take  an  oath  of  office.  Six  constitu- 
tions (Argentina,  Chile,  Colombia,  Panama,  Paraguay  and 
Uruguay)  mention  the  Deity  in  the  oath ;  while  Brazil,  Ecua- 
dor, Guatemala,  Honduras  and  Mexico  require  a  form  of 
promise  similar  to  the  oath  in  the  Constitution  of  the 
United  States;  and  the  remaining  five  states  merely  allude 
to  a  required  oath.  The  constitutions  of  Bolivia,  Salvador 
and  Venezuela  state  that  before  taking  his  office,  the  can- 
didate shall  make  a  solemn  promise  to  fulfill  his  duties ;  in 
Peru  no  one  may  exercise  public  functions  who  has  not  taken 
his  oath  to  comply  with  the  constitution,  and  in  Costa  Rica, 
provision  is  made  for  the  administration  of  the  oath  by  the 
functionary  in  charge  of  the  executive  power  in  case  the 
candidate  can  not  appear  on  the  day  appointed  for  his  in- 
auguration. The  presidents  of  Argentina,  Chile,  Paraguay 
and  Uruguay  receive  the  oath  of  office  from  the  President  of 
the  Senate,  in  the  presence  of  both  houses  of  Congress;  in 


^Constitution  of  Costa  Rica,  Art.  95,  1. 
2Constitution  of  Salvador,  Art.  83. 
^Constitution  of  Mexico,  Art.  82. 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  383 

Bolivia,  Brazil,  Costa  Rica,  Ecuador  and  Mexico  it  is  made 
"before  Congress" ;  whereas,  in  Colombia,  it  is  administered 
by  the  "President  of  Congress,"  and  in  Panama,  by  the 
President  of  the  Assembly.  For  the  other  presidents,  the 
method  of  administration  of  the  oath  is  not  definitely  pre- 
scribed. 

The  president's  term  is  six  years  in  Argentina,  Colombia, 
Guatemala,  Honduras,  and  Nicaragua;  in  Chile  and  Peru, 
five ;  in  Venezuela,  seven ;  in  all  the  other  states,  four  years ; 
and  in  no  one  of  them  is  he  eligible  for  re-election  until  a 
period  equal  to  the  length  of  his  term  as  president  has 
elapsed.  Ecuador,  Paraguay  and  Uruguay  require  double 
the  period  to  intervene  between  terms;  the  constitution  of 
Mexico  says  a  president  may  never  be  re-elected ;  in  Panama 
he  is  eligible  to  succeed  himself  only  in  case  he  resigns  his 
office  eighteen  months  prior  to  his  election. 

These  constitutions  uniformly  agree  that  the  chief  ex- 
ecutive and  the  vice-president  shall  receive  a  compensation, 
fixed  by  Congress,  which  shall  not  be  increased  during  the 
term  of  service.^ 

The  date  of  the  beginning  of  the  president's  term  is  spec- 
ified in  the  constitutions  of  some  states,  as,  for  example, 
Brazil,  November  15;  Costa  Rica,  May  8;  Chile,  September 
1;  Guatemala,  March  15;  Honduras,  February  1;  Mexico, 
December  1 ;  Nicaragua,  January  1 ;  Panama,  October  1 ; 
Salvador,  March  1 ;  Uruguay,  March  1 ;  Venezuela,  May  23. 
The  date  is  left  to  be  determined  by  Congress  in  Argentina, 
Bolivia,  Colombia,  Ecuador,  Paraguay,  and  Peru. 

The  method  of  electing  the  chief  executive  varies  some- 
what in  these  countries,  although  in  most  states  it  may  be 
characterized  briefly  as  a  "direct,  popular  vote."  The  Cen- 
tral American  Republics  and  Bolivia,  Colombia,  Ecuador, 
and  Uruguay  vote  directly  for  president;  the  votes  are 
counted  by  Congress  and  the  candidate  who  has  received  an 
absolute  majority  is  declared  elected.     If  no  majority  has 


^Salary  of  president  of  Argentina:  $31,600  gold;  Brazil,  $36,000; 
Chile,  $13,000;  Mexico,  $25,000;  Panama,  $18,000.  Bulletins  of  Pan- 
American  Union,  1918. 


384      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

been  obtained,  Congress  is  empowered  to  elect  the  president. 
But  its  choice  is  restricted  much  as  in  the  United  States. 
For  example,  in  Costa  Rica  and  Brazil  the  choice  lies  be- 
tween the  two  having  the  highest  number  of  votes ;  in  Ecua- 
dor and  Nicaragua,  between  ''citizens  having  equal  number 
of  votes";  in  Honduras,  Guatemala  and  Salvador,  between 
the  three  highest ;  and  in  Colombia  and  Panama  the  number 
is  not  limited.  In  Ecuador^  and  Peru,^  if  the  vote  of  the 
people  is  equally  divided,  and  a  tie  in  Congress  also,  the 
decision  is  made  by  lot ;  and  in  Brazil,^  the  oldest  candidate 
is  declared  elected  in  such  a  case. 

In  only  six  states  is  there  an  electoral  college;  namely, 
Mexico,  Peru,  Paraguay,  Chile,  Brazil  and  Argentina.*  In 
the  first  two,  electoral  returns  are  obtained  "in  the  manner 
prescribed  by  law";  in  the  last  four  the  process  is  carried 
on  in  very  much  the  same  way  as  in  the  United  States. 
Argentina  elects  twice  as  many  electors  as  there  are  sena- 
tors and  deputies;  Brazil  and  Chile,  three  times  as  many; 
and  Paraguay,  four  times  the  number.  In  each  case  the 
votes  are  counted  before  a  joint  session  of  the  two  houses 
of  Congress  and  the  candidate  who  has  received  a  majority 
of  votes  is  elected.  If  no  candidate  has  received  a  majority 
of  votes.  Congress,  in  joint  session,  must  choose  the  candi- 
date in  all  six  states  from  among  the  two  having  the  highest 
number  of  votes. 

In  Venezuela^  the  National  Congress  elects  the  president. 
Within  fifteen  days  of  its  meeting  in  the  first  year  of  each 
presidential  period,  an  electoral  body  of  fourteen  members 
of  the  National  Congress  is  chosen — one  representative, 
either  a  senator  or  deputy,  for  each  of  the  states,  and  one 
for  the  federal  district.  This  electoral  body  then  sets  apart 
one  of  the  three  following  days  for  the  choice  of  a  president 
and  gives  notice  of  the  date  selected,  thorough  the  public 
press.     Upon  the  designated  date,  the  Commission,  with 


^Constitution  of  Ecuador,  Art.  85, 
2Constitution  of  Peru,  Art.  83. 
^Constitution  of  Brazil,  Art.  47,  2. 
^Bulletins  of  Pan-American  Union,  1918-19. 
^Constitution  of  Venezuela,  Arts.  70.  71,  72. 


Division  of  Latin-AmeHcan  Affairs  385 

two-thirds  of  its  members  as  a  quorum,  proceeds  to  elect 
in  public  session  one  of  their  number  or  one  chosen  "else- 
where" to  be  president.  In  the  same  session  the  vice-presi- 
dent is  elected. 

The  matter  of  succession  in  case  of  failure  of  the  president 
to  function  in  office  is  seldom  treated  alike  in  any  two  states. 
The  ten  states  which  elect  no  vice-president  are  Costa  Rica, 
Chile,  Colombia,  Guatemala,  Honduras,  Mexico,  Nicaragua, 
Panama,  Peru  and  Uruguay.  In  Chile  the  Minister  of  the 
Interior  becomes  vice-president,  and  after  him,  the  senior 
member  of  the  cabinet  or  the  senior  non-ecclesiastical  mem- 
ber of  the  Council  of  State.  In  Honduras  if  the  vacancy  is 
permanent,  the  executive  power  is  vested  in  the  council  of 
secretaries  of  state  who  order  an  election  for  president  to  be 
held  within  a  month  after  the  vacancy  occurs.  The  Con- 
gress of  Colombia  elects  annually  two  designados,  sl  first 
and  a  second,  who  exercise  power  temporarily  in  case  the 
office  of  president  becomes  vacant.  Costa  Rica,  Nicaragua 
and  Panama  choose  one  from  three  designados  as  president 
pro  tempore.  Guatemala,  also,  has  two  designados  who  are 
eligible  as  temporary  presidents  in  the  order  of  their  elec- 
tion by  the  Assembly ;  and  within  eight  days  of  his  succes- 
sion the  president  pro  tempore  must  call  for  an  election  of 
president  to  be  held  within  six  months.  The  new  term  dates 
from  the  15th  of  March  following. 

In  Mexico  the  method  employed  for  filling  a  vacancy  in 
the  presidential  office  depends  upon  whether  the  vacancy 
occurs  in  the  first  two  or  the  last  two  years  of  the  term. 
In  the  first  case,  if  Congress  is  in  session,  two-thirds  of  it 
choose  by  secret  ballot  and  majority  vote  a  temporary  presi- 
dent. The  same  Congress  issues  a  call  for  a  presidential 
election,  endeavoring  to  have  the  date  set  coincide  with  the 
date  of  the  next  election  of  members  of  Congress.  If  Con- 
gress is  not  in  session  the  permanent  committee  acts  as  the 
electoral  college.  This  permanent  committee  consists  of 
twenty-nine  members,  fifteen  representatives  and  fourteen 
senators  appointed  by  their  respective  houses  on  the  eve  of 
the  day  of  adjournment.  In  other  respects  its  functions 
are  mainly  legislative.     It  is  made  the  duty  of  the  substitute 


386      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

president  chosen  by  the  permanent  committee  to  summon 
Congress  in  extra  session  in  order  that  it  may  call  a  new 
presidential  election.  If  the  vacancy  occurs  in  the  last  two 
years  of  a  presidential  term,  there  are  also  two  courses 
which  may  be  followed :  Congress  may  choose  a  substitute 
to  serve  out  the  unexpired  term;  or  if  Congress  is  not  in 
session,  the  permanent  committee  may  summon  Congress, 
whereupon  it  becomes  the  duty  of  that  body  to  choose  a 
successor.  In  case  of  temporary  incapacity,  an  acting  presi- 
dent must  be  chosen  by  Congress.  A  president  chosen  under 
such  circumstances  is  disqualified  for  election  for  the  ensu- 
ing term. 

If  both  president  and  vice-president  fail  to  perform  their 
duties,  various  orders  of  succession  prevail.  The  Congress 
of  Argentina  determines  who  shall  next  fill  the  office  of 
president;  Bolivia,  with  two  vice-presidents,  specifies  the 
President  of  the  Senate  or  the  President  of  the  Chamber 
of  Deputies ;  in  Brazil  the  order  of  succession  is :  vice-presi- 
dent, vice-president  of  the  Senate,  president  of  the  Chamber 
of  Deputies,  president  of  the  Supreme  Federal  Tribunal; 
in  Ecuador:  vice-president,  president  of  the  Senate,  presi- 
dent of  the  Chamber  of  Deputies;  in  Salvador,  after  the 
vice-president  comes  one  of  three  designados  in  the  order 
in  which  they  are  appointed.  Whenever  it  becomes  neces- 
sary for  the  first  vice-president  of  Venezuela  to  leave  his 
office  during  the  regular  term,  the  second  vice-president 
succeeds  and  calls  the  Senate  together  at  once  for  the  elec- 
tion of  a  person  who  shall  replace  him  as  president.  In 
Paraguay  the  choice  of  the  public  functionary  who  is  to  act 
as  president  is  left  to  Congress  until  a  new  president  is 
elected.    A  similar  method  is  followed  in  Peru. 

Almost  every  constitution  expressly  states  that  the  presi- 
dent must  leave  his  office  on  the  day  set  by  the  constitution 
or  by  Congress  for  the  expiration  of  his  term.  Many  con- 
stitutions, likewise  provide  for  the  removal  of  the  president 
from  office  in  case  he  fails  properly  to  discharge  his  duties. 
In  respect  to  impeachment,  the  constitutions  of  Argentina 
and  Paraguay  follow  that  of  the  United  States  almost  ex- 
actly. In  Guatemala  and  Honduras  no  grounds  for  impeach- 


Division  of  Latin- American  Affairs  387 

ment  are  stated,  while  in  all  the  others,  the  president  is 
"held  responsible"  in  cases  of  treason  and  common  offenses 
against  the  constitution.  These  are  defined  in  Costa  Rica 
and  Ecuador  more  fully  to  include  (1)  interference  with 
elections,  (2)  refusal  to  order  the  publication  and  execution 
of  acts  of  Congress,  (3)  restricting  the  freedom  of  the 
courts;  and,  in  the  former  country,  (4)  provoking  an  un- 
just war,  and  (5)  exercising  extraordinary  powers  without 
the  consent  of  Congress. 

In  all  these  republics  the  executive  is  suspended  from 
the  exercise  of  his  powers  while  his  case  is  pending.  Again, 
in  all  these  states  impeachment  proceedings  are  instituted 
in  the  lower  house  wherever  bicameral  legislatures  exist, 
and  in  Congress  in  those  states  having  a  unicameral  form  of 
government,  except  in  Venezuela  where  the  Supreme  Court 
has  jurisdiction  over  the  case  from  the  beginning,  and  in 
Ecuador  where,  in  the  absence  of  the  president,  articles  of 
impeachment  may  be  prepared  by  the  Council  of  State.  In 
Bolivia  and  Peru  the  senate  decides  whether  there  are 
grounds  for  accusation;  in  the  other  countries  the  lower 
house  decides  whether  or  not  the  accused  shall  be  tried.  In 
Bolivia,  Costa  Rica,  Honduras,  Nicaragua,  Peru,  Salvador 
and  Venezuela  the  Supreme  Court  tries  all  cases  of  im- 
peachment; in  the  others,  the  senate  serves  as  the  trial 
body,  except  in  Brazil  where  the  senate  tries  impeachment 
cases  and  the  Federal  Supreme  Court  tries  cases  of  com- 
mon offenses  against  the  constitution. 

In  case  of  the  president's  conviction,  the  constitutions  of 
Argentina,  Mexico,  Paraguay  and  Uruguay,  like  that  of  the 
United  States,  authorize  subsequent  trial  and  punishment. 
before  the  ordinary  courts.  In  Chile  the  punishment  in  im- 
peachment cases  is  removal  from  office  and  temporary  or 
permanent  deprivation  of  political  rights.  In  Panama,  if 
the  offense  has  been  either  an  act  in  excess  of  his  constitu- 
tional power  or  an  act  of  coercion  in  the  Assembly,  the 
president  is  removed  from  office  and  disqualified  from  hold- 
ing any  other  public  office ;  but,  if  he  is  convicted  of  treason, 
he  is  subject  to  further  trial  under  the  ordinary  process  of 


388      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

law.  In  the  other  countries  trial  and  punishment  are  left 
to  the  "law." 

In  Chile ^  the  impeachment  process  is  rather  more  elab- 
orately planned.  The  president  is  not  only  subject  to  im- 
peachment during  his  term  of  office  but,  during  the  year 
immediately  succeeding  the  end  of  his  term,  he  may  be  ac- 
cused of  having  violated  the  constitution  or  of  having  com- 
promised the  honor  and  safety  of  the  state.  Impeachment 
proceedings  are  instituted  in  the  Chamber  of  Deputies 
where  one  of  the  eight  succeeding  days  is  set  apart  to  hear 
the  accused  reply  to  the  charges  made  against  him.  It  is 
then  decided  whether  or  not  the  proceedings  are  to  be  con- 
tinued. If  the  decision  is  in  the  affirmative,  a  committee 
of  nine  is  chosen  by  lot  from  among  the  deputies  present, 
who  must  report  within  five  days  whether  or  not  there  are 
sufficient  grounds  for  impeachment.  The  Chamber  then 
gives  a  hearing  to  the  committees,  to  the  instigators  of  the 
charges,  to  the  one  accused,  and  to  all  the  deputies  who  care 
to  take  part  in  the  debate.  If  it  is  decided  to  go  further 
with  the  case,  three  managers  are  appointed  from  the 
Chamber  who  represent  this  body  in  the  prosecution  before 
the  Senate.  The  accused  is  suspended  from  his  official 
functions  which  may  be  resumed  if  the  Senate  does  not 
render  its  decision  within  six  months  from  the  date  on 
which  the  prosecution  was  begun.  The  Senate  tries  the 
official,  and  a  two-thirds  vote  is  necessary  for  conviction. 
He  is  then  tried  before  the  ordinary  law  courts  and,  if  con- 
victed there,  is  punished  accordingly. 

The  powers  of  the  executives  of  the  Latin-American  re- 
publics resemble  closely  those  of  the  president  of  the  United 
States.  The  powers  and  duties  of  the  presidents  may  be 
grouped  under  five  main  heads:  First,  those  relating  di- 
rectly or  indirectly  to  legislation.  In  all  these  states  one  of 
the  first-mentioned  duties  of  the  chief  executive  is  to  pro- 
mulgate the  laws  of  Congress,  to  obey  them  and  to  cause 
others  to  obey  them  also.  Other  duties  commonly  prescribed 
are  to  call  extra  sessions  of  Congress  and  to  send  annual  mes- 


iConstitution  of  Chile,  Arts.  84-91. 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  389 

sages  to  that  body  within  the  time  set  by  the  constitutions — 
which  in  Salvador  is  within  eight  days  of  meeting,  and 
fifteen,  in  Nicaragua.  In  Brazil  the  president  sends  the 
annual  message  to  the  secretary  of  the  Senate  who  reads  it 
to  Congress  on  the  opening  day. 

All  these  states  give  to  the  President  the  veto  power.  He 
is  allowed  ten  days  in  which  to  consider  a  bill,  except  in 
Chile  and  Venezuela  which  give  him  fifteen,  in  Salvador 
where  he  has  eight  days ;  and  in  Colombia  where  he  is  given 
from  six  to  fifteen  days.  If  he  has  not  returned  the  bill 
signed  or  with  his  objections  within  the  time  set,  it  be- 
comes a  law.  If  Congress  refuses  to  adopt  his  suggestions 
for  amending  the  bill,  it  may  in  all  states  pass  the  measure 
by  a  two-thirds  vote  over  the  veto  of  the  executive,  who 
must  publish  and  promulgate  the  law  at  once.  In  case 
Congress  adjourns  before  the  bill  is  returned,  the  executives 
of  Brazil,  Chile  and  Ecuador  must  publish  the  bills  with 
their  reasons  for  vetoing  them  in  the  public  press.  In  all 
the  republics  bills  once  rejected  may  be  reconsidered  in  a 
following  session.  The  assemblies  of  Honduras  and  Sal- 
vador remain  in  session  ten  and  eight  days,  respectively 
beyond  the  day  set  by  law  for  adjournment,  during  which 
time  the  President  must  return  any  bills  in  his  hands. 

The  second  class  of  powers  conferred  upon  the  President 
are  those  relating  to  military  matters.  In  all  Latin-Ameri- 
can republics  the  President  is  commander-in-chief  of  the 
army  and  navy,  and  he  may,  in  every  instance,  with  the 
consent  of  Congress,  take  personal  command  of  the  army 
in  the  field,  in  which  case  he  ceases  to  retain  his  character 
as  a  civil  official  and  becomes  only  a  military  chief  and  must 
resign  his  executive  office  to  the  successor  named  in  the  con- 
stitution. The  President  may  grant  letters  of  marque  and 
reprisal.  In  Venezuela  he  may  declare  war,  and  in  Hon- 
duras he  may  both  declare  war  and  make  peace.  In  the 
other  countries,  Congress  first  authorizes  the  declaration  of 
war,  which  is  issued  by  the  President.  Special  war  powers 
are  granted  to  him  in  Venezuela,  namely,  to  ask  the  states 
to  aid  in  national  defense,  to  collect  taxes  a  year  in  advance 
of  the  date  they  are  due,  to  suspend  the  usual  rights  of 


390      The  Southive stern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

citizens,  to  expel  foreigners  who  interfere  with  the  peace, 
to  change  temporarily  the  location  of  the  capital  and  to 
prosecute  citizens  for  treason. 

Presidential  powers  relating  to  foreign  affairs  are  very 
similar  to  those  in  the  United  States.  Each  executive  must 
maintain  foreign  relations,  receive  ministers  and  envoys 
from  foreign  countries,  appoint  diplomatic  agents  (in  Ar- 
gentina, Brazil,  Chile,  Paraguay  and  Uruguay,  with  the 
consent  of  the  Senate)  and  conduct  diplomatic  negotiations. 
In  Venezuela  the  President  may  forbid  entrance  to  foreign- 
ers engaged  in  the  service  of  any  worship,  or  religion.  The 
presidents  of  all  the  republics  make  treaties,  submitting 
them  to  Congress,  or  to  the  Senate  in  Argentina,  Brazil, 
Chile,  Mexico,  Paraguay,  Uruguay,  for  ratification. 

The  power  to  appoint  and  remove  the  secretaries  of  state 
is  also  given  to  all  the  presidents ;  and  they  appoint,  in  six 
states — Argentina,  Brazil,  Chile,  Colombia,  Panama  and 
Paraguay — the  justices  of  the  Federal  Supreme  Court. 
In  Honduras  the  President  may  receive  the  resignations  of 
the  justices  and  appoint  others  ad  interim.  In  addition, 
the  President  may  exercise  rights  of  ecclesiastical  patron- 
age in  Argentina,  Chile,  Costa  Rica,  Paraguay  and  Peru. 
The  President  may  grant  or  refuse,  according  to  law  of 
Congress,  to  promulgate  decrees  of  ecclesiastical  Council, 
bills  or  briefs  of  the  Supreme  Pontiff  of  Rome.  He  has  the 
right  to  nominate  the  bishops  of  Paraguay  from  among 
three  names  presented  to  him  by  the  Senate. 

Certain  miscellaneous  powers  are  delegated  to  the  Presi- 
dent. In  Argentina,  Chile,  Colombia,  Costa  Rica,  Ecuador, 
Guatemala,  Honduras,  Mexico,  Panama  and  Paraguay  he 
may  grant  pardons  and  commutations  to  ministers  of  state 
and  other  offenders  within  the  jurisdiction  of  the  Federal 
Tribunals.  Important  financial  duties  including  the  col- 
lection and  disbursement  of  national  funds  are  imposed  upon 
the  presidents  of  Argentina,  Chile,  Colombia,  Costa  Rica, 
Guatemala,  Honduras,  Nicaragua,  Panama,  Paraguay,  Peru, 
Uruguay  and  Venezuela.  In  Honduras  he  must  "watch 
over"  the  coinage,  weights  and'  measures.  In  Nicaragua 
he  may  contract  loans  which  he  must  report  to  the  Assem- 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  391 

bly,  and  he  may  sell  or  lease  national  property.  In  Colom- 
bia, Ecuador,  Guatemala,  Panama  and  Salvador,  the  Pres- 
dent  supervises  public  instruction ;  in  Colombia,  Nicaragua, 
Panama  and  Venezuela  he  grants  letters  of  naturalization. 
The  Board  of  Health  of  Panama  is  under  his  jurisdiction, 
and  in  Nicaragua  and  Venezuela  he  directs  the  taking  of  the 
census.  In  the  latter  country,  also,  he  manages  such  public 
utilities  as  the  telegraph  and  telephone;  and  here  he  also 
directs  the  improvement  of  public  lands,  manages  salt  mines 
and  the  tobacco  and  alcohol  revenue. 

Two  specific  restrictions  upon  the  executive  offices  in  all 
the  Latin- American  constitutions  are:  the  decrees  of  the 
executive  are  declared  invalid  unless  signed  by  the  secreta- 
ries of  the  proper  departments ;  and  the  presidents  are  not 
permitted  to  leave  their  respective  countries  without  the 
consent  of  Congress  except  in  Bolivia,  Chile,  Guatemala, 
Honduras,  Mexico  and  Nicaragua.  In  Argentina  and  Para- 
guay the  President  may  not  even  leave  the  capital  without 
the  permission  of  Congress. 

In  addition  to  the  President  and  Vice-President,  the  ex- 
ecutive branch  of  government  in  each  Latin-American  re- 
public includes  cabinet  ministers  or  secretaries  of  state; 
and  some  states  have  a  "Council  of  Government."  In  Ar- 
gentina there  are  five  ministers  or  secretaries  of  state, 
namely,  of  the  interior,  of  foreign  affairs,  of  the  treasury, 
of  justice,  worship  and  public  instruction,  and  of  war  and 
the  navy.  They  receive  a  salary  determined  "by  law"  and 
they  are  appointed  and  removed  by  the  President.  Each 
is  individually  responsible  for  the  acts  signed  by  him  and 
is  liable  to  impeachment  by  Congress.  As  soon  as  Congress 
meets,  each  minister  reports  on  the  state  of  his  own  depart- 
ment. No  minister  may  be  a  member  of  either  branch  of 
Congress;  he  may  attend  and  take  part  in  debates,  but  he 
has  no  vote.  The  cabinet  of  Paraguay  is  like  that  of  Ar- 
gentina in  respect  to  qualifications  and  duties. 

In  Bolivia  the  number  of  secretaries  is  determined  by 
statute.     Each  must  have  the  same  qualifications  as  a  dep- 


392      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

uty^  or  member  of  the  lower  house  of  Congress.  They 
must  sign  the  decrees  of  the  President  and  submit  to  Con- 
gress reports  on  the  business  of  their  respective  depart- 
ments. They  may  take  part  in  the  debates  of  either  house, 
but  must  withdraw  before  a  vote  is  taken.  They  are  ap- 
pointed and  removed  by  the  President  and  are  liable  to  im- 
peachment. They  may  also  be  prosecuted  by  private  parties 
before  the  Supreme  Court. 

In  Brazil  the  number  of  ministers  is  also  determined  by 
act  of  Congress,  and  they  are  appointed  and  removed  by  the 
President.  Their  annual  reports,  addressed  to  the  Presi- 
dent, are  distributed  to  all  the  members  of  Congress.  Al- 
though they  may  appear  personally  before  the  committees 
of  Congress,  they  do  not  appear  at  the  regular  sessions  and 
may  address  Congress  only  in  writing.  They  are  also  sub- 
ject to  impeachment. 

The  ministers  of  Chile  (number  determined  **by  law'*) 
must  be  native-born  citizens  and  have  an  income  of  $500. 
They  sign  the  orders  of  the  President  for  their  respective 
departments,  and  submit  to  Congress  annually  individual 
reports  and  budgets  for  their  departments.  They  attend 
congressional  sessions,  but  have  no  vote,  and  they  may  be 
impeached  by  Congress.  Chile  has  also  a  Council  of  State 
which  is  composed  of  a  member  of  the  superior  courts  re- 
siding in  Santiago,  a  church  dignitary,  a  general  in  the 
army  or  navy,  a  "head  of  some  office"  in  the  treasury  de- 
partment, an  individual  who  has  filled  the  position  of  min- 
ister of  state,  diplomatic  agent,  intendant,  governor,  or 
chief  of  a  municipality,  appointed  by  the  President  of  the 
republic,  and  three  councilors  chosen  by  the  Senate  and 
three  by  the  Chamber  of  Deputies.  The  presiding  officer 
of  the  Council  of  State  is  the  President  of  Chile,  and  in  his 
absence,  its  own  Vice-President,  chosen  annually  from 
among  its  members.  Cabinet  members  have  no  vote  in  the 
council,  and  if  a  councilor  is  appointed  to  the  cabinet,  he 


1  Constitution  of  Bolivia,  Art.  56.  He  must  be  a  Bolivian  by  birth 
or  naturalization,  twenty-five  years  old,  have  lived  in  Bolivia  at  least 
five  years;  and  have  an  income  of  $80  from  a  profession,  industry, 
or  real  property;  and  must  not  have  been  condemned  to  corporal 
punishment  by  an  ordinary  tribunal. 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  393 

must  vacate  his  seat  in  the  council.  The  council  advises 
the  President,  fills  vacancies  in  the  Supreme  Court,  nom- 
inates three  persons  for  archbishoprics  and  other  high 
church  offices,  considers  questions  of  patronage,  recom- 
mends the  dismissal  of  cabinet  ministers,  and  considers 
the  prosecution  of  military  governors  and  governors  of  de- 
partments. The  President  submits  to  the  council  all  bills 
which  he  intends  to  introduce  in  Congress,  all  acts  sent  to 
him  by  Congress  for  his  approval,  the  annual  budget,  and 
all  matters  in  which  he  desires  their  opinion. 

The  cabinet  ministers  of  Colombia  may  introduce  bills 
in  both  houses,  take  part  in  debates,  and  advise  the  Presi- 
dent. They  are  appointed  and  removed  by  him  and  their 
departments  are  created  by  Congress.  Each  must  submit 
to  Congress  during  the  first  fifteen  days  of  its  meeting  a 
written  report  on  the  condition  of  business  in  his  depart- 
ment. The  Colombian  Council  of  State  has  seven  members 
including  the  Vice-President  of  Colombia  who  is  chairman, 
and  six  members  appointed  by  Congress.  Cabinet  members 
may  be  heard  in  the  council,  but  they  have  no  vote.  Their 
term  is  four  years,  one-half  of  the  council  being  renewed 
every  two  years.  They  act  as  an  advisory  board  to  the 
President;  but  their  opinions  are  not  binding  except  when 
advising  the  commutation  of  the  death  penalty. 

The  secretaries  of  Costa  Rica  may  attend  Congress  but 
may  not  vote ;  they  may  introduce  at  any  time  such  bills  as 
are,  in  their  opinion,  necessary;  and  they  submit  to  Con- 
gress annually,  a  report  on  the  business  of  their  respective 
departments.  Their  number  is  set  by  law  and,  when  sit- 
ting together,  they  constitute  the  "Council  of  Government," 
to  which  the  President  submits  for  discussion  the  matters 
upon  which  he  desires  their  advice.  As  a  council,  they  may 
add  to  their  number  any  other  citizens  whom  the  President 
of  the  state  may  wish  to  invite.  The  executive  departments 
of  Panama  and  Peru  are  similar  in  composition  and  duties 
to  those  of  Costa  Rica. 

In  Ecuador  there  are  five  secretaries  of  state,  whose  de- 
partments are  determined  by  law.  They  present  to  Con- 
gress during  the  first  six  days  of  its  session  written  re- 
ports; they  attend  the  regular  sessions  of  Congress  where 


394      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

they  are  allowed  to  vote;  and  they  may  be  impeached  on 
charges  of  treason  or  misconduct  in  office.  The  Council 
of  State  consists  of  the  Vice-President  of  the  republic,  the 
secretaries  of  state,  the  attorney-general,  the  chief  justice 
of  the  tribunal  of  accounts,  the  rector  of  the  central  uni- 
versity, two  senators,  two  deputies,  and  two  private  citi- 
zens qualified  to  be  deputies.  Congress  elects  annually  the 
last  seven  who  may  be  re-elected.  The  Vice-President  of 
Ecuador  is  president  of  the  council.  In  the  recess  of  Con- 
gress its  powers  are :  to  authorize  the  executive  to  make 
loans,  to  prepare  articles  of  impeachment  against  the  Presi- 
dent, to  fill  vacancies  in  the  Council  of  State,  and  to  exercise 
all  other  power  given  to  it  by  the  constitution.  The  Presi- 
dent refers  to  this  body  all  bills  sent  from  Congress  for  his 
approval,  and  before  applying  to  Congress  for  authority  to 
declare  war,  he  consults  with  it. 

In  Guatemala,  the  secretaries  of  state,  whose  number  and 
departments  are  determined  by  "law,"  sign  all  the  decrees 
of  the  President,  report  to  the  assembly  and  take  part  in 
it.  The  Council  of  State  has  as  its  members  the  secreta- 
ries of  state  and  nine  councilors,  five  of  whom  are  appointed 
by  the  Assembly  and  four  by  the  President  of  the  state. 
They  serve  for  two  years,  and  must  be  twenty-one  years  old 
and  citizens.  Their  main  duties  are :  to  make  rules  for  in- 
terior government  of  the  country,  and  to  advise  the  Presi- 
dent. 

In  Honduras  the  President  has  from  three  to  six  secreta- 
ries who  administer  the  departments  of  state.  They  coun- 
tersign the  acts  of  the  President,  report  to  Congress  within 
five  days  of  its  opening  session,  advise  with  Congress,  at- 
tend sessions  and  take  part  in  debate,  but  they  do  not  vote. 
There  is  no  Council  of  State. 

In  Mexico  also  the  secretaries  are  determined  "by  law." 
Each  must  be  a  Mexican  citizen  by  birth,  twenty-five  years 
old,  and  in  full  enjoyment  of  his  rights.  As  heads  of  de- 
partments of  state  they  sign  the  decrees  of  the  executive, 
report  to  Congress  on  the  business  of  their  departments 
and  they  may  be  called  by  either  house  to  inform  it  when- 
ever a  bill  relative  to  a  department  is  under  discussion. 

The  secretaries  of  State  in  Nicaragua  may  not  be  eccle- 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  395 

siastics  and  may  be  Central  Americans  or  naturalized  Span- 
ish Americans.  Their  number  is  determined  by  law.  They 
may  not  be  either  contractors  of  public  works  in  which  the 
nation  is  interested,  or  debtors  or  creditors  of  the  treasury. 
They  attend  the  Assembly  and  may  debate,  but  they  do  not 
vote.  They  confer  with  the  Assembly  when  it  summons 
them. 

In  Salvador  there  may  be  no  more  than  four  ministers 
of  state,  all  of  whom  must  be  natives,  resident  in  the  re- 
public, twenty-five  years  old,  of  "well-known  honesty  and 
ability."  No  contractor  of  public  works  is  eligible.  Citi- 
zens of  other  republics  of  Central  America  who  have  these 
qualifications  and  have  lived  for  five  years  in  Salvador  may 
also  be  ministers.  They  sign  all  decrees  of  the  executive 
and  attend  Congress  when  summoned,  but  withdraw  before 
a  vote  is  taken. 

The  State  of  Uruguay  has  a  National  Council  of  Admin- 
istration^ consisting  of  nine  members  chosen  by  direct  elec- 
tion of  the  people,  together  with  an  equal  number  of  alter- 
nates, one-third  of  the  places  being  given  to  the  chief  mi- 
nority party.  Their  term  is  six  years,  one-third  being  re- 
newed every  two  years  as  is  the  Senate  of  the  United  States, 
and  they  are  ineligible  for  re-election  until  after  a  lapse  of 
two  years.  Their  salary  is  provided  by  special  law.  The 
majority  leader  in  the  last  election  acts  as  president  of  the 
council.  He  has  a  voice  and  a  vote  in  its  proceedings.  At 
least  five  members  must  be  present  at  every  session  and  all 
resolutions  of  the  council  are  revokable  by  a  vote  of  a  ma- 
jority of  its  members.  The  functions  of  the  council  in- 
clude all  matters  of  administration  which  have  not  been  re- 
served to  the  President  or  other  authorities,  including  the 
supervision  of  public  instruction,  public  works,  labor,  in- 
dustries, agriculture,  charities  and  sanitation.  The  Coun- 
cil of  Administration  prepares  the  annual  budget,  renders 
accounts  of  national  finances  to  the  Assembly,  advises  with 
the  President  regarding  measures  of  taxation  and  loans  and 
currency.  Its  members  may  be  present  and  take  part  in 
the  sessions  of  Congress  but  they  may  not  vote. 


1  Constitution  of  Uruguay,  Art.  82,  translated  in  Southwestern  Po- 
litical Science  Quarterly,  Vol.  1,  95ff   (1920). 


396      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

In  Venezuela  the  ministers,  determined  "by  law,"  must 
be  Venezuelans  by  birth  and  twenty-five  years  old.  They 
are  appointed  and  removed  by  the  President.  They  sign 
his  acts  and  are  responsible  for  them.  They  submit  every 
two  years  to  Congress,  an  itemized  report  of  the  business 
of  their  respective  departments,  including  the  budget.  They 
may  address  Congress  from  the  floor ;  and  are  liable  to  im- 
peachment for  treason,  violation  of  the  constitution,  em- 
bezzlement of  public  funds,  or  for  common  offenses. 

In  concluding  this  analysis  of  Latin-American  constitu- 
tions, it  should  perhaps  be  pointed  out  that,  although  there 
is  a  strong  general  resemblance  between  (the  executive 
branch  of  our  own  government  and  that  of  the  Central  and 
South  American  countries,  there  is  a  very  conspicuous  ab- 
sence in  the  latter  of  any  indication  of  an  attempt  closely 
to  imitate  or  reproduce  our  chief  executive  without  regard 
to  local  conditions.  Indeed,  most  Latin-American  consti- 
tutions embody  interesting  and  important  departures  from 
provisions  relating  to  the  executive  in  the  Constitution  of 
the  United  States  which  seem  to  reflect  not  only  some  knowl- 
edge of  the  unwritten  law  of  our  constitution  but  also  no 
small  degree  of  originality  and  practical  statesmanship  on 
the  part  of  the  framers  of  these  constitutions. 

Of  these  points  of  difference  the  following  may  be  noted 
as  perhaps  the  most  striking:  (1)  the  greater  fullness  with 
which  the  qualifications  for  the  presidential  office  are  set 
forth  and  the  greater  variety  of  the  qualifications  which  are 
prescribed;  (2)  the  popular  election  of  the  President  in 
all  Central  American  and  in  four  South  American  states, 
and  by  Congress  in  the  case  of  Venezuela,  whereas  an  elec- 
toral college  is  created  in  only  six  of  the  South  American 
states;  (3)  the  omission  of  the  office  of  Vice-President  in 
ten  states;  (4)  the  elaborate  provisions  relating  to  the 
removal  of  the  President  and  to  the  filling  of  vacancies  in 
the  presidency;  (5)  the  greater  explicitness  with  which  the 
composition  and  functions  of  the  cabinet  are  set  forth ;  and, 
especially  (6)  the  express  permission  granted  to  the  cab- 
inet in  all  states  but  one  (Brazil)  to  participate  in  the  pro- 
ceedings of  Congress,  although  without  a  vote  everywhere 
except  in  Ecuador. 


CENTRAL  AMERICAN  FEDERATION 


One  of  the  most  interesting  among  recent  developments 
in  Latin  American  affairs  is  the  conclusion  on  January  19, 
1921,  of  a  treaty  of  union  signed  by  representatives  of  Gua- 
temala, El  Salvador,  Honduras,  and  Costa  Rica,  at  San  Jose, 
the  capital  of  the  last-named  state.  This  important  step, 
the  culmination  of  developments  noted  in  prior  issues  of  the 
Quarterly,  makes  a  very  brief  presentation  of  the  main 
facts  in  connection  with  Central  American  Federation  and 
the  publication  of  the  Treaty  of  Union  especially  timely. 

During  the  period  of  Spanish  domination,  the  five  Central 
American  countries,  including  Nicaragua  which  was  not 
represented  in  the  drafting  of  the  present  treaty,  were 
united  as  provinces  in  the  captaincy-general  of  Guatemala, 
itself  lying  within  the  vice-royalty  of  New  Spain  or  Mexico. 
Upon  the  Declaration  of  Independence  of  these  provinces  on 
September  15,  1821,  there  was  for  a  brief  period  a  move- 
ment in  favor  of  annexation  with  the  Mexican  Empire  of 
Iturbide.  With  the  fall  of  Iturbide,  however,  a  National 
Constituent  Assembly  declared  the  five  provinces  to  be  a  fed- 
eral republic  and  such  they  remained  until  1838  when  the 
federation  was  dissolved  after  a  period  of  almost  continuous 
disturbance  and  civil  war.  Since  that  time  the  question  of 
creating  a  new  a  federal  state  out  of  these  so  closely  related 
countries  has  agitated  the  political  atmosphere  in  Central 
America  almost  without  interruption.  At  different  periods 
the  attitude  of  the  different  states  has  shown  variations,  but 
in  general  the  movement  for  a  renewal  of  the  Union  has 
been  most  strongly  championed  by  the  three  middle  states. 
El  Salvador,  Honduras,  and  Nicaragua,  and  most  strongly 
resisted  by  Guatemala.  In  1842,  1849,  and  1895  the  three 
central  states  mentioned  above  actually  entered  into  real 
though  extremely  shortlived  unions.    The  present  treaty  is 


398      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

the  immediate  outcome  of  a  movement  started  and  enthu- 
siastically supported  by  El  Salvador  for  commemorating 
the  centenary  of  independence  by  the  re-establishment  of 
a  Union  of  all  five  of  the  Central  American  states.  Nica- 
ragua, however,  did  not  participate  in  the  treaty  ,though  it 
is  hoped  that  she  v^ill  join  as  soon  as  the  Federation  be- 
comes an  actual  fact.  The  text  of  the  Treaty  of  Union  fol- 
lows: 

The  Central  American  Federation  Treaty* 

The  governments  of  the  Republics  of  Guatemala,  El  Sal- 
vador, Honduras,  and  Costa  Rica,  regarding  it  as  an  exalted 
patriotic  duty  to  bring  to  consummation  as  soon  as  possible 
the  reconstruction  of  the  Federal  Republic  of  Central  Amer- 
ica, on  a  basis  of  justice  and  equality  which  will  guarantee 
peace,  maintain  harmony  among  the  states,  assure  the  ben- 
efits of  liberty,  and  promote  the  general  welfare,  have  agreed 
to  the  conclusion  of  a  compact  of  union  to  this  end,  and  for 
that  purpose  have  designated  as  plenipotentiaries  the  follow- 
ing :  On  behalf  of  the  Government  of  Guatemala,  Messrs. 
Salvador  Falla  and  Carlos  Salazar ;  on  behalf  of  the  Gov- 
ernment of  Salvador,  Messrs.  Reyes  Arrieta  Rossi  and 
Miguel  T.  Molina ;  on  behalf  of  the  Government  of  Honduras, 
Messrs.  Alberto  Ucles  and  Mariano  Vasquez ;  and  on  behalf 
of  the  Government  of  Costa  Rica,  Messrs.  Alejandro  Al- 
varado  Quiros  and  Cleto  Gonzales  Viquez ;  who  after  having 
exchanged  credentials  and  having  found  them  in  due  and 
correct  form  agreed  to  the  following  stipulations : 

Art.  I.  The  Republics  of  Guatemala,  El  Salvador,  Hon- 
duras, and  Costa  Rica  are  joined  in  a  perpetual  and  indis- 
soluble union  and  shall  constitute  henceforth  a  sovereign 


*This  translation  was  made  from  the  text  of  the  treaty  as  published 
in  La  Gaceta  of  New  York  for  February  5,  1921,  with  the  kind  con- 
sent of  the  editor,  Mr.  R.  Viera.  The  text  of  the  treaty  was  sent  to 
said  publication  by  Mr.  J.  Dols  Corpeno  of  San  Jose,  Costa  Rica. 
The  copy  of  the  paper  containing  the  text  of  the  treaty  was  secured 
through  the  courtesy  of  Mr.  R.  C.  Diaz  of  the  Legation  of  Honduras 
in  Washington,  D.  C— H.  G.  J. 


Division  of  Latin-AmeHcan  Affairs  399 

and  independent  nation  to  be  designated  as  the  Federation 
of  Central  America. 

The  federal  state  shall  have  the  duty  and  the  power  to 
preserve  the  union,  and,  in  accordance  with  the  federal  con- 
stitution, internal  order  within  the  states. 

Art.  II.  The  four  states  will  meet  through  deputies  in  a 
National  Constituent  Assembly  and  will  accept  henceforth 
as  the  supreme  law  the  Constitution  adopted  by  said  as- 
sembly in  conformity  with  the  stipulations  of  the  present 
treaty. 

Art.  III.  Each  state  will  retain  its  autonomy  and  inde- 
pendence for  the  management  and  direction  of  its  internal 
affairs,  so  far  as  not  in  conflict  with  the  Federal  Constitu- 
tion, and  similarly  will  retain  all  powers  not  intrusted  by 
the  Constitution  to  the  Federal  Government. 

The  constitutions  of  the  several  states  will  remain  in 
force  so  far  as  they  do  not  conflict  with  the  provisions  of 
the  federal  constitution. 

Art.  IV.  Until  the  Federal  Government  shall  have  se- 
cured through  diplomatic  channels  the  modification,  abroga- 
tion, or  substitution  of  treaties  in  effect  between  the  states 
of  the  Federation  and  foreign  nations,  each  state  shall 
faithfully  observe  and  execute  such  treaties  as  bind  them  in 
their  relations  with  any  and  all  foreign  states,  to  the  full 
extent  of  existing  obligations. 

Art.  V.  The  National  Constituent  Assembly  in  drafting 
the  Federal  Constitution  shall  observe  the  following  con- 
ditions : 

(a)  There  shall  be  a  Federal  District,  governed  directly 
by  the  Federal  authorities.  The  Assembly  shall  designate 
and  delimit  the  territory  out  of  which  this  district  shall  be 
formed,  and  shall  indicate  the  town  or  place  within  the 
same  which  shall  constitute  the  political  Capital  of  the  Fed- 
eration. The  state  or  states  from  which  the  territory  for 
the  Federal  District  shall  be  taken,  shall  at  once  cede  the 
same  gratis  to  the  Federation. 

(b)  The  Government  of  the  Federation  shall  be  repu- 
blican, popular,  representative,  and  responsible.  Sover- 
eignty shall  reside  in  the  Nation.     Public  powers  shall  be 


400      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

limited  by  and  exercised  in  accordance  with  the  Constitu- 
tion. There  shall  be  three  powers  of  government:  Execu- 
tive, Legislative,  and  Judicial. 

(c)  The  Executive  power  shall  be  exercised  by  a  Federal 
Council,  consisting  of  popularly  elected  deputies.  Each 
state  shall  elect  one  deputy  and  one  alternate,  natural-born 
citizens  of  the  state  that  elects  them,  and  more  than  forty 
years  of  age.  The  term  of  office  of  the  council  shall  be  five 
years. 

The  deputies  and  their  alternates  shall  reside  in  the  Fed- 
eral Capital.  The  alternates  shall  attend  the  meetings  of 
the  Council,  but  shall  have  no  vote  except  when  their  re- 
spective principals  are  not  present. 

It  shall  be  necessary  for  valid  action  by  the  Council  that 
all  the  states  shall  be  represented.  Decisions  of  the  Council 
shall  be  reached  by  an  absolute  majority  of  votes,  save  in 
t)iose  cases  for  which  the  Constitution  may  require  an  ex- 
traordinary majority.  In  case  of  tie.  the  President  shall 
have  a  double  vote. 

The  Council  shall  choose  from  among  the  deputies  a  Pres- 
ident and  a  Vice-President  for  the  period  of  one  year.  The 
President  may  not  be  re-elected  for  the  year  immediately 
following. 

The  President  of  the  Council  shall  serve  as  President  of 
the  Federation  but  he  shall  always  act  in  the  name  of  and 
by  resolution  or  order  of  the  Federal  Council. 

The  Council  shall  apportion  the  conduct  of  public  affairs 
among  its  members  in  the  manner  deemed  convenient  and 
may  intrust  the  management  of  any  department  it  may  see 
fit  to  the  alternates. 

The  Constitution  shall  prescribe  the  method  of  conducting 
foreign  affairs  and  shall  complete  the  organization  of  the 
executive  power. 

(d)  The  Legislative  power  shall  be  vested  in  a  Senate 
and  a  Chamber  of  Deputies. 

The  Senate  shall  consist  of  three  senators  for  each  state, 
chosen  by  the  Congress  thereof.  Senators  must  be  more 
than  forty  years  of  age  and  citizens  of  one  of  the  states. 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  401 

Their  term  of  office  shall  be  six  years  and  one-third  shall  be 
chosen  every  two  years. 

The  Chamber  of  Deputies  shall  consist  of  popularly 
elected  representatives  in  the  ratio  of  one  deputy  for  every 
hundred  thousand  inhabitants  or  major  fraction  thereof. 
The  Constituent  Assembly  shall  determine  the  number  of 
representatives  to  which  each  state  is  entitled,  pending  the 
taking  of  a  general  federal  census. 

Senators  and  Deputies  may  be  re-elected  indefinitely. 
The  quorum  in  each  chamber  shall  consist  of  three-fourths 
of  the  total  membership.  No  law  shall  be  valid  unless  ap- 
proved separately  in  each  chamber  by  an  absolute  majority 
vote  of  the  deputies  and  by  a  two-thirds  vote  of  the  senators, 
and  unless  receiving  the  sanction  of  the  Executive  in  a  man- 
ner to  be  prescribed  by  the  Constitution. 

(e)  The  Judicial  power  shall  be  exercised  by  a  Supreme 
Court  of  Justice  and  such  inferior  courts  as  may  be  estab- 
lished by  law. 

The  Senate  shall  select,  from  a  list  of  twenty-one  can- 
didates to  be  presented  by  the  Executive,  seven  judges  to 
constitute  the  Court  and  three  alternates  to  fill  temporary 
vacancies  in  the  same.  Permanent  vacancies  among  the 
judges  or  alternates  shall  be  filled  by  a  new  selection.  Judges 
shall  be  irremovable  except  by  judicial  sentence. 

The  Supreme  Court  shall  have  jurisdiction  over  contro- 
versies to  which  the  Federation  shall  be  a  party;  over  con- 
troversies between  two  or  more  states;  over  conflicts  be- 
tween the  authorities  within  a  state  or  within  the  Federa- 
tion concerning  the  constitutionality  of  their  acts ;  and  over 
all  other  matters  which  by  the  Constitution  or  organic  law 
are  intrusted  to  it. 

States  between  which  there  are  pending  questions  con- 
cerning boundaries  or  concerning  the  execution  of  judg- 
ments or  awards  rendered  before  the  conclusion  of  this 
treaty  may  submit  the  same  to  arbitration.  The  Federal 
Court  may  take  cognizance  of  such  cases  as  arbiter,  pro- 
vided the  states  concerned  submit  them  to  its  decision. 

(f)  The  Federation  guarantees  to  each  inhabitant  ]i 
berty  of  thought  and  of  conscience.    It  may  not  legislate  on 


402      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

matters  of  religion.  The  principle  of  freedom  of  worship, 
so  far  as  not  contrary  to  public  morals  or  good  customs, 
shall  be  obligatory  on  all  the  states. 

(g)  The  Federation  recognizes  the  principle  of  the  in- 
violability of  human  life  for  political  offenses  or  connections, 
and  guarantees  the  equality  of  all  men  before  the  law,  as  well 
as  the  protection  owed  by  the  state  to  the  destitute  and  the 
proletariat. 

(h)  The  Federation  guarantees  freedom  of  instruction. 
Primary  instruction  shall  be  conapulsory,  and  so  far  as  given 
in  public  schools  free,  directed  and  supported  by  the  states. 
Institutions  of  secondary  instruction  may  be  founded  and 
supported  by  the  Federation,  by  States,  by  municipalities, 
and  by  private  initiative.  The  Federation  shall  establish 
as  soon  as  possible  a  National  University,  and  shall  give 
preference  in  their  immediate  establishment  to  departments 
of  agriculture,  industries,  commerce,  and  the  mathematical 
sciences. 

(i)  The  Federation  likewise  guarantees  in  all  states  the 
protection  of  individual  rights,  as  also  the  freedom  of  the 
vote  and  of  succession  to  office. 

(j)  The  army  is  an  institution  intended  for  national 
defense  and  the  maintenance  of  public  peace  and  order.  It 
is  in  essence  passive  and  may  not  deliberate.  Soldiers  in 
active  service  shall  not  enjoy  the  right  to  vote. 

The  army  shall  be  exclusively  under  the  orders  of  the 
Federal  Council.  The  states  may  maintain  no  other  force 
than  a  police  to  safe-guard  public  order.  Garrisons  which 
may  be  maintained  by  the  Federation  within  any  state, 
whether  permanent  or  temporary,  shall  be  commanded  by 
federal  officers,  appointed  and  removable  by  the  Council. 
In  case,  however,  a  rebellion  occurs  within  a  state  or  there 
is  just  cause  for  fearing  a  serious  outbreak,  the  said  forces 
shall  place  themselves  at  the  disposal  of  the  government  of 
the  state.  If  these  forces  are  insufficient  to  put  down  the  re- 
bellion the  government  of  the  state  shall  request  and  the 
Federal  Council  shall  send  the  necessary  reinforcements. 

The  law  shall  determine  the  provisions  for  military  ser- 
vice, for  garrisons,  and  for  military  instruction  in  a  man- 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  403 

ner  to  subject  them  to  fixed  rules.  The  Federal  Council 
shall  have  free  disposition  of  arms  and  instruments  of  war 
actually  existing  within  the  states,  after  having  provided 
the  latter  with  the  equipment  necessary  for  the  police  forces. 

The  states  acknowledge  it  to  be  necessary  and  convenient 
that  the  Federal  Government  reduce  military  forces  and 
armaments  to  the  smallest  possible  dimensions,  so  as  to  ex- 
tend aid  to  agriculture  and  industries  and  to  diminish  in 
the  interest  of  common  progress  the  excessive  sums  ex- 
pended in  the  maintenance  of  the  military. 

(1)  The  Federal  Government  shall  administer  the  na- 
tional revenues  which  shall  be  distinct  from  those  of  the 
states.  The  law  will  establish  federal  taxes  and  contribu- 
tions. 

(m)  The  states  shall  continue  to  administer  their  in- 
ternal and  external  debts.  The  Federal  Government  shall 
be  under  obligation  to  see  that  this  function  is  faithfully 
performed  and  that  the  requisite  income  is  dedicated  to  this 
purpose. 

Henceforth  no  state  may  contract  for  or  incur  external 
obligations  without  authorization  by  a  law  of  the  state  and 
ratification  by  a  federal  law;  nor  may  it  enter  into  agree- 
ments which  may  in  any  manner  compromise  its  sover- 
eignty or  independence  or  the  Integrity  of  its  territory. 

(n)  The  Federation  may  not  contract  for  or  incur  for- 
eign loans  without  the  authorization  of  a  law  approved  by 
a  two-thirds  vote  of  the  Chamber  of  Dcfputies  and  a  three- 
fourths  vote  of  the  Senate, 

(o)  The  Constitution  may  fix  a  date  after  v^hich  ability 
to  read  and  write  may  be  required  for  voting  for  federal 
officers. 

(p)  The  Constitution  shall  determine  the  provisions  for 
its  own  amendment.  But  if  a  proposal  for  amendment  in- 
volves the  alteration  of  any  of  the  fundamental  principles 
enumerated  in  this  treaty,  there  shall  be  absolutely  req- 
uisite, in  addition  to  the  general  requirements  of  the  Con- 
stitution, the  consent  of  the  legislature  of  every  state. 

(q)  The  Constitution  shall  fix  and  enumerate  the  mat- 
ters which  shall  be  exclusively  for  federal  legislation.    The 


404      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

National  Constituent  Assembly  in  drafting  the  Constitution 
shall  determine  the  plan  and  principles  of  the  same,  apply- 
ing the  bases  herein  laid  down  and  in  no  case  contravening 
the  same.  Immediately  after  framing  the  Constitution,  the 
Assembly  shall  issue  the  supplementary  laws  dealing  with 
the  liberty  of  the  press,  the  protection  of  the  individual, 
and  the  liberty  of  domicile,  which  shall  be  regarded  as  part 
of  the  Federal  Constitution. 

Art.  VI.  The  National  Constituent  Assembly  referred 
to  in  Article  II  of  the  present  treaty  shall  consist  of  fifteen 
deputies  from  each  state,  to  be  elected  by  the  Congress 
thereof.  Deputies  must  be  more  than  twenty-five  years  of 
age  and  citizens  of  one  of  the  five  Central  American  states. 
They  shall  enjoy  immunity  of  persons  and  property  from 
the  time  of  their  election  until  one  month  after  the  close  of 
the  sessions  of  the  Assembly. 

Art.  VII.  A  quorum  in  the  Assembly  shall  consist  of 
three-fifths  of  the  total  number  of  deputies.  Voting 
shall  be  by  states.  In  the  absence  of  one  or  more  of 
the  representatives  of  any  state,  the  deputies  present  shall 
cast  the  vote  of  the  entire  deputation.  In  case  of  diver- 
gencies among  the  votes  of  the  representatives  of  any  state, 
the  vote  of  the  state  shall  be  cast  by  a  majority  decision  of 
the  representatives.  In  the  event  of  a  tie  vote,  the  decision 
of  those  voting  in  conformity  with  the  majority  opinion  of 
the  other  states  shall  prevail,  or  in  case  of  a  tie  vote  as 
among  other  states,  that  vote  shall  prevail  which  is  in  ac- 
cord with  the  majority  vote  of  the  individual  deputies. 
The  decisions  of  the  Assembly  shall  be  governed  by  a  ma- 
jority vote  of  the  states. 

Art.  VIII.  For  the  execution  of  the  provisions  contained 
herein  there  shall  be  constituted  at  once  a  Provisional  Fed- 
eral Council,  consisting  of  one  representative  from  each 
state.  Said  council  shall  assume  the  direction  of  the  pre- 
liminary measures  necessary  for  the  organization  of  the 
Federation  and  its  first  government;  more  especially  the 
convocation  of  the  National  Constituent  Assembly ;  the  pro- 
mulgation of  the  Constitution,  constituent  laws,  and  other 
resolutions  of  the  Assembly;  the  completion  of  the  neces- 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  405 

sary  arrangements  of  the  election' by  the  states  of  represen- 
tatives on  the  Council,  of  Senators  and  of  Deputies;  and 
surrendering  its  place  to  the  Federal  Council  as  soon  as  its 
functions  shall  have  been  performed. 

Art.  IX.  The  members  of  the  Provisional  Council  shall 
be  more  than  forty  years  of  age  and  citizens  of  the  states 
v^hich  select  them.  They  shall  enjoy  immunity  in  persons 
and  property  from  the  time  of  their  election  until  one  month 
after  the  termination  of  their  office.  Furthermore,  they 
shall  enjoy  in  the  state  in  which  they  exercise  their  func- 
tions all  the  privileges  and  dignities  which  by  international 
law  or  custom  may  be  accorded  to  the  chiefs  of  diplomatic 
missions. 

Art.  X.  The  Congress  of  each  state  shall  immediately 
after  having  approved  this  treatjr,  select  the  delegate  to  rep- 
resent it  on  the  Provisional  Council,  and  shall  notify  through 
the  appropriate  channels  the  International  Central  American 
Office'  of  its  choice.  This  Office  in  turn  shall  notify  the  gov- 
ernments and  the  elected  delegates  of  its  receipt  of  the  rati- 
fication of  three  states  to  the  end  that  within  the  time  spec- 
ified hereinafter  the  representatives  may  meet  and  begin 
their  work. 

Art.  XI.  The  Provisional  Federal  Council  shall  meet  in 
the  City  of  Tegucigalpa,  capital  of  Honduras,  not  later  than 
thirty  days  after  the  third  ratification  of  the  present  treaty 
shall  have  been  deposited  in  the  International  Central  Amer- 
ican Office. 

Art.  XII.  The  presence  of  at  least  three  delegates  shall 
be  requisite  for  valid  action  by  the  Provisional  Council. 

Art.  XIII.  The  Provisional  Council  shall  choose  a  Presi- 
dent and  a  Secretary  both  of  whom  shall  sign  all  necessary 


^This  office  is  known  as  the  Central  American  Bureau  and  is  located 
in  Guatemala  City.  Provision  was  first  made  for  its  establishment  in 
the  San  Jose  Conference  of  1906.  This  provision  was  reaffirmed  in 
the  Washington  Conference  of  1907  and  the  Bureau  was  established 
under  a  special  convention  determining  its  composition  and  functions. 
It  acts  principally  as  a  clearing  house  for  statistical  and  other  data 
and  publishes  on  official  quarterly  magazine  known  as  "Centro 
America." 


406      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

'documents.  The  Secretai*y  shall  conduct  the  correspond- 
ence. 

Art.  XIV.  When  the  fourth  ratification  shall  have  taken 
place,  the  International  Central  American  Office,  or  the  Pro- 
visional Council  if  the  latter  is  already  in  existence,  shall 
summon  the  respective  delegate  to  take  his  place  on  the  Pro- 
visional Council. 

Art.  XV.  The  Congress  of  each  state  shall  at  the  same 
time  that  it  selects  a  representative  to  the  Provisional 
Council,  in  accordance  v^ith  Article  X  of  the  present  treaty, 
also  elect  the  delegates  to  v^hich  the  state  is  entitled  in  the 
Constituent  Assembly. 

Art.  XVI.  Upon  certification  of  the  election  of  delegates 
to  the  Constituent  Assembly,  the  Minister  of  Foreign  Rela- 
tions of  the  respective  states  shall  notify  the  International 
Central  American  Office  and  shall  deliver  their  credentials 
to  the  elected  delegates. 

Art.  XVII.  As  soon  as  the  International  Central  Amer- 
ican Office  shall  have  notified  the  Provisional  Council  of  the 
official  election  of  delegates  by  at  least  three  states,  the 
Provisional  Council  shall  convoke  the  National  Constituent 
Assembly  to  meet  in  the  City  of  Tegucipalpa  on  a  date  to  be 
fixed  in  the  call.  The  latter  shall  be  made  known  by  tele- 
graph to  the  Ministers  of  Foreign  Relations  in  the  several 
states  and  to  the  individual  deputies  thirtj^  days  or  more  in 
advance.  The  Provisional  Council  shall  provide  thiat  the 
convocation  of  the  Constituent  Assembly  shall  take  place  at 
the  latest  on  September  15,  1921,  the  centennial  of  the  po- 
litical independence  of  Central  America. 

Art.  XVIII.  The  ratification  of  this  treaty  by  three  of 
the  contracting  parties  shall  be  sufficient  to  make  it  effective 
and  binding  as  between  them.  The  state  which  may  not 
ratify  this  treaty  shall  nevertheless  be  admitted  into  the 
Federation  at  any  time  upon  request.  The  Federation  shall 
admit  the  same  without  further  delay  upon  the  submission 
of  the  law  approving  this  treaty,  the  Federal  Constitution, 
and  the  constituent  laws.  In  that  event  the  Federal  Council 
and  the  two  legislative  chambers  shall  be  increased  as  here- 
in provided. 


Division  of  Latin-American  Affairs  407 

Art.  XIX.  The  contracting  states  sincerely  regret  that 
their  sister  republic  of  Nicaragua  does  not  at  once  concur 
in  joining  the  Federation  of  Central  America.  Should  the 
said  republic  decide  later  on  to  enter  the  Union,  the  Federa- 
tion shall  extend  every  facility  for  its  admission  in  the 
treaty  to  be  entered  into  with  this  purpose  in  view.  In  any 
case  the  Federation  shall  continue  to  regard  and  treat  said 
republic  as  an  integral  part  of  the  Central  American  family, 
as  also  the  state  which  for  any  reason  may  fail  to  ratify  the 
present  treaty. 

Art.  XX.  Each  state  shall  turn  over  to  the  Provisional 
Council  the  sum  designated  by  it  to  cover  the  expenses  of 
performing  its  functions  and  shall  fix  and  pay  the  per 
diems  of  its  respective  representatives  in  the  Constituent 
Assembly. 

Art.  XXI.  The  present  treaty  shall  be  submitted  as  soon 
as  possible  in  each  state  to  the  legislative  approval  required 
by  its  constitution.  The  ratifications  shall  be  certified  at 
once  to  the  International  Central  American  Office  to  which 
a  copy  in  the  usual  form  shall  be  sent.  On  receiving  the 
copy  of  each  ratification  said  Office  shall  notify  the  other 
states  and  such  notice  be  deemed  as  a  valid  exchange. 

Done  in  San  Jose  de  Costa  Rica  in  quadruplicate,  the 
nineteenth  of  January,  1921.  In  testimony  of  which  the  fol- 
lowing sign  the  present  treaty. 

On  behalf  of  the  Republic  of  Guatemala ;  Salvador  Falla, 
Carlos  Salazar; 

On  behalf  of  the  Republic  of  El  Salvador;  R.  Arrieta 
Rossi,  M.  T.  Molina  ; 

On  behalf  of  the  Republic  of  Honduras;  Alberto  Ucles, 
Mariano  Vasquez; 

On  behalf  of  the  Republic  of  Costa  Rica;  Alejandro  Al- 
varado  Quiros,  Cleto  Gonzales  Viquez. 


NEWS    AND    NOTES 

EDITED   BY   W.    C.   BINKLEY 

University  of  Texas 

The  Annual  Meeting  of  the  Southwestern  Political 
Science  Association 

When  the  second  annual  meeting  of  the  Southwestern 
Political  Science  Association  began  its  sessions  at  the  Uni- 
versity of  Texas,  Austin,  Texas,  on  the  morning  of  Thurs- 
day, March  24,  1921,  it  became  evident  to  the  group  of 
men  who  had  been  responsible  for  its  formation  a  little 
more  than  a  year  earlier,  that  the  organization  had  devel- 
oped into  something  more  than  a  vision.  The  auditorium 
of  the  University  Y.  M.  C.  A.  building  was  comfortably 
filled  with  an  audience  which  showed  its  interest  by  re- 
turning  to  each  of  the  following  sessions,  and  the  regis- 
tration disclosed  the  fact  that  at  least  twenty  delegates 
representing  other  institutions  and  activities  away  from 
Austin  were  present.  A  year  previously  it  had  been  an- 
nounced that  the  purpose  of  the  organization  was  to  ad- 
vance the  interest  of  political  science,  economics,  and  so- 
ciology in  the  six  states  qf  the  Southwest — Arkansas, 
Louisiana,  Oklahoma,  Texas,  New  Mexico,  and  Arizona. 
The  program  itself  served  as  ample  evidence  of  the  fact 
that  this  purpose  was  being  realized.  With  the  single 
exception  of  Arizona,  every  state  of  the  group  was  repre- 
sented, and  among  those  participating  were  economists, 
sociologists,  political  scientists,  historians,  and  public  of- 
ficials. The  report  of  the  secretary-treasurer  at  the  busi- 
ness meeting  showed  the  total  membership  of  various 
classes  to  be  114,  and  that  the  Association  has  a  sub- 
stantial balance  of  funds  with  which  to  begin  the  coming 
fiscal  year. 

The  session  for  Thursday  morning  was  on  the  subject 
of  State  and  Local  Taxation,  and  was  begun  with  Pro- 


Anniml  Meeting  of  the  Association  409 

fessor  H.  G.  James  of  the  University  of  Texas  presiding. 
An  address  of  welcome  was  delivered  by  President  R.  E. 
Vinson,  of  the  University  of  Texas.  This  was  followed  by 
the  presidential  address  of  Hon.  A.  P.  Wooldridge  on 
"Municipal  Taxation."  President  Wooldridge  then  took 
the  chair  and  papers  were  read  by  Professor  E.  T.  Miller 
of  the  University  of  Texas,  on  "State  Tax  Reform  and  the 
Farmer,"  and  Hon.  George  Vaughan,  of  Little  Rock,  Ar- 
kansas, on  "The  Model  System  of  State  and  Local  Taxa- 
tion as  Applicable  to  the  States  of  the  Southwest."  A 
spirited  discussion  followed  under  the  leadership  of  Hon. 
James  A.  King,  State  Tax  Commissioner  of  Texas. 

This  was  followed  by  two  luncheon  conferences  at  the 
Driskill  Hotel  on  methods  of  instruction.  The  economics 
and  sociology  group  was  presided  over  by  Professor  W. 
M.  W.  Splawn,  of  the  University  of  Texas,  and  the  polit- 
ical science  group  by  Professor  C.  G.  Haines  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Texas. 

The  afternoon  session  on  Reorganization  in  State  Gov- 
ernment was  opened  at  2  o'clock  with  Professor  R.  G. 
Caldwell,  of  Rice  Institute  presiding.  The  program  con- 
sisted of  papers  by  Professor  F.  F.  Blachly  of  the  Uni- 
versity of  Oklahoma,  on  "Recent  Developments  in  State 
Budget  Reform  in  Relation  to  the  Southwestern  States," 
and  Professor  D.  Y.  Thomas  of  the  University  of  Arkansas, 
on  "Administrative  Reorganization  in  Arkansas,"  and  an 
address  by  Professor  A.  N.  Holcombe  of  Harvard  Uni- 
versity on  the  reorganization  of  state  administration  in 
general. 

Members  of  the  Association  had  dinner  at  the  Country 
Club  under  the  auspices  of  the  Austin  Chamber  of  Com- 
merce, and  this  was  followed  by  the  principal  address  of 
the  meeting.  Professor  A.  N.  Holcombe,  of  Harvard  Uni- 
versity, who  had  come  to  Austin  for  the  double  purpose 
of  addressing  the  Home  Economics  Convention,  held 
earlier  in  the  week,  and  the  Southwestern  Political  Science 
Association,  gave  a  masterly  lecture  on  "The  States  as  the 
Agents  of  the  Nation." 

The  morning  session  for  Friday,  March  25,  on  Land 


410      The  Southioestern  Political  Science  Quarterhj 

Problems  in  the  Southwest  was  presided  over  by  Professor 
W.  M.  W.  Splawn,  of  the  University  of  Texas.  A  paper 
on  'The  Size  of  Farms  and  Ranches"  was  read  by  Pro- 
fessor A.  B.  Cox,  Chief  of  the  Division  of  Farm  and  Ranch 
Economics  in  the  Agricultural  and  Mechanical  College 
of  Texas,  and  one  on  "Land  Settlement  and  Resettlement," 
by  Dr.  L.  C.  Gray  of  the  Office  of  Farm  Management  and 
Farm  Economics  of  the  United  States  Department  of  Agri- 
culture. 

On  Friday  afternoon  the  program  was  devoted  to  the 
subject  of  Mexican  Affairs,  with  Professor  H.  G.  James 
of  the  University  of  Texas  presiding.  Hon.  Enrique  Ruiz, 
Mexican  Consul  at  San  AntOjnio  brought  greetings  from 
the  new  Mexican  government.  He  was  followed  by  papers 
prepared  by  Professor  C.  F.  Coan  of  the  University  of  New 
Mexico,  on  ''Federalism  in  Mexico,"  Professor  N.  A.  N. 
eleven  of  the  University  of  Arkansas,  on  "Some  Social 
Aspects  of  the  Mexican  Constitution  of  Nineteen  Seven- 
teen," and  Professor  C.  W.  Hackett  of  the  University  of 
Texas,  on  "The  New  Regime  in  Mexico."  The  session 
was  closed  with  an  address  by  Hon.  Eduardo  Ruiz,  Mex- 
ican Consul  General  at  San  Francisco. 

On  Friday  evening  Dr.  L.  C.  Gray,  of  the  United  States 
Department  of  Agriculture  delivered  an  able  lecture  on 
^'An  Agricultural  Outlook." 

Immediately  following  the  afternoon  session  the  visitors 
were  taken  for  a  ride  over  the  city  in  automobiles  fur- 
nished by  the  Austin  Chamber  of  Commerce,  and  after  the 
evening  session  they  were  entertained  at  a  smoker  at  the 
University  Faculty  Club. 

The  closing  program  of  the  meeting  on  Saturday  morn- 
ing consisted  of  a  joint  session  with  the  Texas  Conference 
of  Statewide  Social  Agencies.  Professor  M.  S.  Handman, 
of  the  University  of  Texas,  presided,  and  the  general 
topic  was  on  Training  fox  Social  Service.  A  paper  on 
"The  Need  for  Social  Service  Training"  was  read  by  Pro- 
fessor J.  C.  Granbery  of  Southwestern  University ;  one  on 
"The  Character  of  Training  for  Social  Service"  by  Pro- 
fessor E.  B.  Reuter  of  Tulane  University ;  and  one  on  "The 


Anmuil  Meeting  of  the  Association  411 

Chicago  Experiment  on  Social  Service  Training"  by  Mr. 
E.  T.  Hiller  of  the  University  of  Texas. 

The  annual  business  meeting  of  the  Association  was 
held  at  the  Driskill  Hotel  at  12 :30  on  Friday.  In  the  ab- 
sence of  President  Wooldridge,  First  Vice-President 
George  B.  Dealey,  of  Dallas,  presided.  Professor  C.  G. 
Haines,  Editor  of  the  Quarterly  reported  upon  the  pro- 
gress and  status  of  the  official  organ  of  the  Association. 
His  report,  as  well  as  that  of  the  membership  committee 
was  accepted,  and  the  election  of  officers  for  the  year 
1921-1922  was  then  taken  up.  Hon.  George  Vaughan, 
of  Little  Rock,  Arkansas  was  chosen  president ;  and  First 
Vice-President  George  B.  Dealey  o<f  Dallas,  Texas,  Sec- 
ond Vice-President  F.  F.  Blachly  of  the  University  of 
Oklahoma,  and  Third  Vice-President  D.  Y.  Thomas  of  the 
University  of  Arkansas,  were  re-elected.  Of  the  two  elec- 
tive members  of  the  executive  committee.  Professor  E.  T. 
Miller  was  re-elected,  while  Professor  E.  B.  Reuter  of  Tu- 
lane  University  was  chosen  to  succeed  Professor  Cockrell, 
who  pleaded  inability  to  serve  longer. 

The  executive  committee,  at  a  meeting  on  Friday  even- 
ing, re-elected  Professor  C.  G.  Haines  as  editor  of  the 
Quarterly,  and  elected  Dr.  W.  C.  Binkley  of  the  Univer- 
sity of  Texas  to  be  secretary-treasurer.  The  officers  se- 
lected at  these  two  meetings,  together  with  Ex-Presidents 
H.  G.  James  and  A.  P.  WoQldridge,  constitute  the  Ex- 
ecutive Council  of  the  Association. 

The  members  of  the  editorial  board,  consisting  of  Pro- 
fessors Blachly,  Handman,  and  Thomas,  were  reappointed 
by  the  Executive  Council,  and  Professor  C.  F.  Coan  of  the 
University  of  New  Mexico  was  added  to  this  board. 

The  University  of  Oklahoma,  Norman,  Oklahoma,  was 
selected  as  the  meeting  place  of  the  Association  for  1922, 
and  it  was  decided  at  the  annual  business  meeting  that  an 
active  membership  campaign  should  be  carried  on  during 
the  next  year.  Each  member  present  pledged  himself  to 
be  responsible  for  the  addition  of  five  new  members  dur- 
ing the  year. 


412      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quai^terhj 
Constitutional  Changes  in  the  1920  Election^ 

Many  suggestions  have  been  advanced  as  to  whether 
the  1920  election  could  be  called  a  referendum  on  the 
question  of  adopting  the  League  of  Nations,  and  in  dis- 
cussing this  matter  the  press  of  the  country  has  prac- 
tically overlooked  the  fact  that  the  election  was  in  reality 
a  referendum,  but  from  another  point  of  view.  In  at 
least  thirty-two  states  the  voters  were  asked  to  express 
their  opinion  on  amendments  to  their  state  constitution. 
Fairly  complete  information  indicates  that  the  aggregate 
number  of  amendments  submitted  was  approximately 
160,  and  that  about  two-thirds  of  these  were  ratified  by 
the  people.  The  adoption  of  one  hundred  consitutional 
amendments  and  the  rejection  of  half  that  many  at  a 
given  time  is  worthy  of  notice,  especially  since  practically 
all  were  of  importance  to  the  localities  concerned  and 
some  were  of  nation-wide  interest. 

The  method  of  submission  falls  intq  three  groups. 
In  Nebraska  and  New  Hampshire  the  revisions  were  pro- 
posed by  constitional  conventions  which  had  been  called 
for  the  purpose.  In  several  states  amendments  were  sub- 
mitted as  a  result  of  initiative  petitions,  while  a  majority 
of  the  changes  were  referred  to  a  vote  of  the  people  by  the 
various  state  legislatures. 

In  numbers,  Nebraska  led  with  forty-one  amendments, 
all  of  which  were  adopted  at  a  special  election  held  in 
September.  Among  these  were  provisions  relating  to  the 
organization  and  procedure  of  the  legislature  and  of  the 
judicial  system  of  the  state,  and  establishing  an  executive 
budget,  a  board  of  pardons,  a  board  of  equalization,  an 
industrial  commission,  and  a  board  of  education  for  nor- 
mal schools.  Among  other  amendments,  one  allowing  a 
verdict  in  civil  cases  o;n  agreement  of  five-sixths  of  the 
jury,  and  one  requiring  the  concurrence  of  five  judges  of 
the   supreme   court  to   declare   laws   unconstitutional   are 


^Prepared  by  the  Editor  of  News  and  Notes. 


Constitutional  Changes  in  1920  Election  413 

especially  interesting.  The  legislature  is  given  permis- 
sion to  regulate  property  rights  of  aliens,  to  protect  public 
rights  in  the  use  of  water  power,  and  to  establish  a  min- 
imum wage  and  regulate  conditions  qf  employment  of 
women  and  children.  Legislative  discretion  is  restricted, 
however,  in  other  provisions  prohibiting  consolidation  of 
competing  public  utility  corporations  without  the  consent 
of  the  railway  commission  and  forbidding  state  aid  for 
sectarian  institutions.  A  new  plan  for  amending  the  con- 
stitution was  provided,  by  which  an  amendment  submitted 
by  the  legislature  is  adopted  by  a  majority  voting  on  the 
question  if  the  affirmative  vote  equals  35  per  cent  of  the 
total  vote  cast  in  the  election. 

New  Hampshire  presents  an  interesting  contrast  to  Ne- 
braska, in  that  all  of  the  amendments  submitted  by  the 
convention  were  defeated.  This  was  due  to  the  provision 
in  the  state  constitution  that  a  two-thirds  majority  i? 
necessary  for  ratification.  Six  of  the  seven  proposals  re- 
ceived a  simple  majority,  but  not  the  required  two-thirds. 
The  most  important  of  these  were  provisions  giving  the 
governor  the  power  to  veto  items  in  appropriation  bills, 
permitting  the  levying  of  an  income  tax,  and  decreasing 
the  membership  of  the  lower  house  of  the  legislature 
from  405  to  not  less  than  300  nor  more  than  325,  and 
changing  the  basis  of  apportionment  from  population  to 
active  voters. 

Proposals  in  other  states  affecting  the  organization  of 
the  government  were  relatively  few.  California  rejected 
a  proposal  to  tighten  up  initiative  procedure,  as  well  as 
one  to  change  the  method  of  calling  a  constitutional  con- 
vention. Arkansas  and  Missouri  refused  to  enlarge  their 
supreme  courts,  while  Idaho  provided  for  an  increase  in 
the  membership  of  this  body  from  three  to  five,  and  gave 
it  jurisdiction  over  appeals  from  the  public  utilities  com- 
mission. Montana  defeated  a  plan  providing  for  a  state 
board  of  administration  to  handle  financial  questions. 
Oregon  adopted  an  amendment  changing  the  term  of 
county  officials  from  two  to  four  years  and  rejected  one 


414      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

providing  for  bifurcated  legislative  sessions.  South  Da- 
kota rejected  a  proposal  for  a  state  board  of  control. 

Measures  providing  for  increases  in  the  salaries  of  state 
officials  were  universally  defeated.  California  refused  to 
increase  judges'  salaries ;  Maryland,  Missouri,  Oklahoma, 
and  Oregon,  those  of  members  of  the  legislature,  and 
Colorado,  Michigan,  South  Dakota,  Washington,  and  Ari- 
zona, those  of  state  officers  in  general.  The  last  state  even 
refused  to  establish  a  minimum  teachers'  salary  of  $1,- 
200. 

The  voters  of  Maine,  New  York,  South  Dakota,  and 
Washington  ratified  amendments  authorizing  bond  issues 
to  pay  bonuses  to  soldiers.  Several  other  states  were  able 
to  accomplish  this  by  means  of  initiative  or  referendum 
laws,  and  in  no  case  was  such  a  proposal  defeated.  High- 
way improvements  projects  did  not  fare  so  well,  being 
defeated  in  Arizona,  Florida,  Washington,  and  Wyoming. 
Five  states  voted  bonds  for  this  purpose  without  resorting 
to  constitutional  amendments,  while  others  provided  for 
such  work  by  changing  their  constitutions.  Of  these  Cali- 
fornia voted  to  create  a  state  highway  finance  board  with 
power  to  increase  the  interest  rate  and  regulate  the  dis- 
posal of  unsold  bonds  in  the  state  treasury.  Minnesota 
authorized  the  creation  of  a  trunk  highway  system,  and 
provided  a  special  motor  vehicle  tax  to  meet  the  necessary 
bond  issue.  Colorado,  Kansas,  and  Virginia  ratified 
amendments  authorizing  the  expenditure  of  public  money 
and  the  incurring  of  bonded  indebtedness  for  highway 
improvements. 

Other  proposals  of  a  financial  nature  were  numerous, 
and  their  fate  varied.  Most  of  these  dealt  with  the  question 
of  taxation,  and  on  the  whole  proved  rather  unpopular.  In 
addition  to  rejecting  a  proposed  state  income  tax.  New 
Hampshire  defeated  an  inheritance  tax  amendment,  while 
income  tax  provisions  were  also  voted  down  in  Maine  and 
Minnesota.  North  Carolina,  on  the  other  hand,  authorized 
such  a  tax  and  coupled  with  it  a  plan  for  reducing  per  capita 
and  property  taxes.  Wyoming  refused  to  adopt  an  amend- 
ment authorizing  a  special  tax  on  live  stock.     Single  tax 


Constitutional  Changes  in  1920  Election  415 

measures  were  rejected  in  California  and  Oregon,  while  in 
the  former  a  proposal  requiring  the  legislature  to  levy  a  poll 
tax  of  not  less  than  four  dollars  upon  aliens  was  adopted  by 
a  large  majority.  Colorado  gave  the  legislature  authority 
to  levy  an  additional  millage  tax  for  the  support  and  im- 
provement of  educational  institutions,  and  Louisiana  pro- 
vided such  a  tax  for  the  support  of  higher  education.  A 
similar  proposal  applying  especially  to  the  state  university 
was  defeated  in  California  by  the  narrow  margin  of  4500 
votes  out  of  a  total  of  765,000  cast  on  the  question.  Okla- 
homa rejected  a  tax  of  the  same  nature  applying  to  public 
schools.  Virginia  and  Texas  voted  favorably  on  measures 
allowing  an  increase  of  local  taxes  for  school  purposes,  while 
South  Dakota  refused  to  adopt  a  similar  proposal.  South 
Carolina  found  it  necessary  to  ratify  over  twenty  amend- 
ments allowing  an  increase  in  municipal  tax  levies  for 
various  purposes  or  in  the  amount  of  municipal  indebted- 
ness, and  Louisiana  had  to  solve  the  problem  of  school  taxes 
for  the  city  of  New  Orleans,  as  well  as  authorize  a  special  tax 
levy  in  that  city  to  meet  the  demands  of  reorganizating  the 
police  force  and  fire  department.  Arizona  refused  to  pro- 
vide for  a  change  in  the  method  of  selecting  members  of  the 
state  tax  commission,  and  Montana  rejected  a  proposal  to 
establish  such  a  commission.  Kansas  and  Minnesota  failed 
to  adopt  general  measures  providing  for  the  classification  of 
property  for  taxing  purposes,  and  for  reorganization  of 
their  financial  system. 

On  the  side  of  apportioning  and  expending  state  funds 
there  were  also  several  questions  to  be  decided,  in  addition 
to  those  already  mentioned.  New  York  adopted  a  general 
amendment  providing  for  better  management  and  retire- 
ment of  the  state  debt.  Pennsylvania  authorized  a  general 
increase  in  the  debt  limitations  of  the  various  subdivisions 
of  the  state,  while  in  Utah  a  proposal  to  raise  the  state  debt 
limitation  was  defeated  by  a  2  to  1  vote.  Kansas  voted 
favorably  on  a  system  of  state  aid  in  the  purchase  of  farms, 
and  South  Dakota  approved  a  similar  plan  for  the  building 
of  urban  homes.  North  Dakota  limited  the  investment  of 
school  funds  to  bonds  issued  within  the  state,  while  Utah 


416      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

and  Montana  changed  their  method  of  apportioning  these 
funds. 

The  question  of  suffrage  and  elections  received  its  share 
of  attention,  several  states  voting  to  strike  the  word  "male" 
from  their  constitutions  in  order  to  conform  with  the  fed- 
eral suffrage  amendment.  Oregon  rejected  a  provision  for 
compulsory  voting,  and  an  absentee  voting  plan  met  the 
same  fate  in  California.  North  Dakota  reduced  the  length 
of  its  residence  requirements  for  voters,  as  did  North  Caro- 
lina ;  and  the  latter  also  abolished  the  poll  tax  requirement. 
Louisiana  made  registration  an  additional  requirement  for 
voting  in  primary  elections,  conventions  or  political  as- 
semblies held  for  the  purpose  of  nominating  party  candi- 
dates. Maine  gave  the  legislature  power  to  authorize  towns 
to  have  more  than  one  voting  place  for  state  and  national 
elections. 

Plans  for  municipal  reform  also  received  consideration  in 
a  few  states,  and  the  results  show  the  usual  lack  of  uniform- 
ity. Virginia  adopted  an  amendment  abolishing  the  classifi- 
cation of  cities  for  purposes  of  establishing  special  forms  of 
government,  as  well  as  one  permitting  non-residents  to  hold 
positions  under  municipal  governments  requiring  special 
training  or  experience.  Utah  rejected  a  proposal  permitting 
cities  and  towns  to  frame  their  own  charters.  The  South 
Carolina  amendments  have  been  mentioned  above,  and  a 
kindred  proposal  in  Michigan  providing  for  the  condemn- 
ing of  adjoining  property  for  public  purposes  by  municipal- 
ities was  defeated. 

Most  of  the  remaining  provisions  were  of  a  more  limited 
nature,  and,  because  of  their  local  application,  were  usually 
restricted  to  a  single  state.  As  a  rule  they  are  of  interest 
as  indicators  of  the  kind  of  special  material  which  is  in- 
cluded in  our  state  constitutions  at  the  present  time.  Per- 
haps the  most  extreme  example  is  to  be  found  in  North  Da- 
kota, where  the  voters  were  asked  to  pass  upon  a  constitu- 
tional amendment  in  order  to  change  the  name  of  the  state 
reform  school  to  state  training  school.  Proposals  to  pro- 
hibit compulsory  vaccination  were  defeated  in  California 
and  Oregon,  and  Oklahoma  refused  to  ratify  a  proposed 


Constitutional  Changes  in  1920  Election  417 

state  insurance  plan.  Michigan  gave  the  legislature  power 
to  regulate  hours  and  conditions  of  employment,  while  Idaho 
rejected  a  proposition  enabling  the  state  to  control  water 
power.  Colorado  denied  permission  to  construct  a  tunnel 
through  the  continental  divide.  Oregon  refused  to  fix  4  per 
cent  as  the  legal  interest  rate  in  the  state.  Pennsylvania 
adopted  an  amendment  relating  to  the  power  of  the  legisla- 
ture to  provide  for  banks  and  trust  companies.  Virginia 
provided  for  an  extension  of  the  compulsory  school  age,  and 
extended  to  women  the  right  to  serve  as  school  trustees. 

It  is  rather  difficult  to  base  any  definite  conclusion  upon 
these  results,  other  than  to  say  that  they  show  little  pro- 
gress in  the  direction  of  excluding  from  our  state  constitu- 
tions an  enormous  amount  of  material  which  does  not  be- 
long there.  The  very  number  of  the  proposals  is  indicative 
of  this  fact,  and  in  this  connection,  the  adoption  of  two- 
thirds  of  the  amendments  submitted  might  be  taken  as  indi- 
cating a  change  in  the  attitude  of  the  electorate.  Such  a 
conclusion  is  impossible,  however,  when  a  more  careful  ex- 
amination discloses  the  fact  that  of  those  measures  which 
were  adopted,  three-fifths  were  in  the  two  states  of  Nebraska 
and  South  Carolina.  Leaving  out  these  states,  the  relative 
standing  changes  to  about  sixty  rejections  as  compared  with 
about  forty  approvals.  Combine  with  this  the  fact  that  in 
most  cases  the  vote  on  the  amendments  was  far  smaller  than 
that  cast  for  state  officials,  and  it  becomes  obvious  that  the 
average  voter  is  either  ignoring  such  proposals,  or  else  is 
still  inclined  to  adhere  to  existing  conditions  rather  than 
risk  a  change.  Few  of  the  measures  were  vicious  in  charac- 
ter although  many  were  perhaps  useless,  but  several  which 
would  have  accomplished  much  needed  changes  were  re- 
jected along  with  the  less  desirable  ones.  In  considering 
the  general  results  the  statement  of  the  New  York  Times 
that  "This  year's  record  can  hardly  serve  to  increase  con- 
fidence in  the  initiative  and  referendum  as  instruments  of 
political  regeneration,"  can  be  quoted  with  safety. 


Notes  From  Arkansas 

PREPARED   BY  D.   Y.   THOMAS 

University  of  Arkansas 

The  new  governor  of  Arkansas  is  inaugurated  about  three 
days  after  the  new  legislature  meets.  The  constitution  re- 
quires the  outgoing  governor  to  send  in  a  message  on  the 
condition  of  the  state  and  making  recommendations.  Usu- 
ally it  receives  scant  consideration. 

This  year  the  message  of  the  outgoing  governor,  C.  H. 
Brough,  was  lengthy,  about  34,000  words.  In  it  he  gave  a 
history  of  his  administration,  including  a  defense  of  some 
things  then  under  fire,  particularly  the  corporations  com- 
mission, the  inheritance  tax  collector,  and  the  county  boards 
of  assessment.  An  impartial  reading  reveals  several  things 
worth  while,  for  example,  the  putting  of  the  state  on  a  cash 
basis  and  keeping  it  there,  provision  for  a  boys'  industrial 
school  (out  of  the  old  reform  school),  a  girls'  industrial 
school,  a  state  farm  for  women,  the  putting  of  the  state  edu- 
cational institutions  on  a  special  tax,  and  the  increase  of  the 
inheritance  tax  collections  through  the  creation  of  the  office 
of  inheritance  tax  collector. 

Among  the  recommendations  of  the  outgoing  governor 
were,  that  provisions  be  made  for  an  executive  budget,  com- 
pulsory auditing  of  county  finances,  giving  the  attorney 
general  authority  in  certain  cases  to  institute  criminal  pros- 
ecutions in  the  lower  courts,  the  retention  of  the  corpora- 
tions commission,  a  negro  reform  school,  increase  of  rev- 
enue for  the  public  schools  and  for  the  state  institutions,  a 
severance  tax,  and  giving  women  the  right  to  hold  office. 

The  inaugural  address  of  Governor  T.  C.  McRae  was 
hardly  one-fourth  as  long  as  the  message  of  Governor 
Brough.  He  asked  the  legislature  to  carry  out  the  pledges 
of  the  Democratic  platform  for  the  abolition  of  useless  of- 
fices, particularly  the  corporations  commission,  the  board  of 
control,  the  penitentiary  commission,  the  inheritance  tax 
collector,  and  the  highway  commission  "as  now  constituted," 
the  institution  of  honorary  boards  in  place  of  those  abol- 


Notes  frorri^  Arkansas  419 

ished,  the  reduction  of  the  tax  commission  to  one  member 
and  giving  to  him  the  collection  of  the  inheritance  taxes. 
He  also  recommended  an  executive  budget,  giving  to  women 
the  right  to  hold  office,  a  gasoline  tax,  and  better  educational 
facilities. 

The  legislature  of  1919  was  characterized  by  an  enormous 
amount  of  road  legislation ;  that  of  1921  by  a  large  amount 
of  repeal  legislation — of  the  special  road  laws.  With  all 
that,  however,  enough  was  left  to  make  possible  a  good  deal 
of  disconnected  road  building. 

The  total  number  of  bills  introduced  was  1261,  of  which 
624  were  in  the  senate,  637  in  the  house.  As  usual  the  vast 
majority  were  local  or  special  in  character,  though  the  high 
maximum  of  1919  for  this  kind  of  legislation  was  not 
reached.  Few  laws  of  a  general  nature  were  enacted,  some 
of  these  of  little  consequence.  Two  amendments  having  al- 
ready been  submitted  by  petition,  one  resubmitting  the  new 
initiative  and  referendum  and  another  removing  the  limit 
on  taxation  for  school  purposes,  only  one  was  left  for  the 
legislature.  Several  proposals  and  two  different  resolutions, 
both  originating  in  the  house,  were  adopted  providing  for 
the  subjection  of  personal  property  to  taxation  for  the  build- 
ing and  upkeep  of  roads.  Possibly  the  governor  will  select 
the  one  to  be  submitted,  though  it  is  not  clear  that  he  has 
any  explicit  authority  to  do  so. 

The  governor's  program  as  outlined  in  the  Democratic 
platform  was  carried  out  only  in  part.  The  salaried  peniten- 
tiary commission  was  abolished  and  an  honorary  commission 
of  five,  one  of  whom  is  a  woman,  was  substituted.  Instead 
of  abolishing  the  corporations  commission  outright  a  com- 
promise was  effected,  restoring  the  old  elective  railroad 
commission  with  slightly  enlarged  powers,  but  leaving  the 
regulation  of  local  utilities  to  local  authorities.  The  privilege 
of  surrendering  charters  for  indeterminable  permits  was 
also  repealed.  The  senate  refused  to  abolish  the  tax  com- 
mission and  the  office  of  inheritance  tax  collector  and  passed 
appropriation  bills  for  their  support,  which  the  house  ac- 
cepted. The  governor  asked  for  a  reorganization  of  the 
highway  department,  but  this  was  refused  by  the  senate. 


420      The  Southvrestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

The  substitution  of  an  honorary  board  for  the  present  sal- 
aried board  of  control  was  refused  by  the  senate,  also  the 
abolition  of  the  state  charities  board,  but  the  house  refused 
to  make  any  appropriation  for  the  former ;  also  for  the  state 
mine  inspector  and  the  oil  inspector. 

Among  the  bills  passed  the  following  may  be  mentioned : 

Permitting  women  to  hold  office. 

Excusing  women  from  compulsory  jury  service. 

Changing  date  of  state  election  from  November  to  October 
so  as  not  to  coincide  with  the  national  election. 

Providing  relief  and  retirement  funds  for  firemen,  and 
policemen  in  Little  Rock  through  a  special  tax. 

Establishing  municipal  courts  in  certain  cities  of  the  first 
class  to  take  the  place  of  police  courts  and  justice  of  the 
peace  courts. 

Making  pipe  lines  common  carriers. 

Withdrawing  state  lands  from  sale  for  a  period  of  five 
years  and  providing  for  leasing.  This  was  caused  by  the 
discovery  of  oil  and  gas  in  the  state. 

Legalizing  the  sale  of  cigarettes  (now  forbidden)  and  im- 
posing a  license  fee  of  $20.00  on  retailers  and  $50.00  on 
wholesalers. 

Increasing  the  special  tax  for  the  support  of  the  Univer- 
sity from  four-ninths  of  a  mill  to  one  mill. 

Authorizing  the  borrowing  of  $350,000  for  building  pur- 
poses at  the  University,  the  notes  to  be  paid  off  in  twenty 
years  out  of  the  proceeds  of  the  millage  tax. 

Fixing  a  uniform  fiscal  year  closing  June  30,  for  all  de- 
partments of  state  government  and  for  state  institutions. 

An  important  revenue  bill,  that  of  Senator  Vaughan  re- 
vising the  entire  system  of  taxation,  passed  the  senate  and 
probably  would  have  passed  the  house,  had  the  session  lasted 
a  few  days  longer. 

The  bill  for  a  severance  tax  of  two  per  cent  on  oil  and  gas 
met  a  similar  fate. 

The  results  seem  to  have  justified  the  establishment  (1913) 
of  a  budget  committee,  consisting  of  a  joint  committee  of 
the  two  houses  and  of  the  auditorial  bureau  (1917),  though 
the  conditions  are  still  far  from  ideal.    The  comptroller  of 


Notes  from  New  Mexico  421 

the  bureau  brings  together  the  requests  of  the  various  de- 
partments of  government  and  estimates  the  probable  rev- 
enue. He  also  sat  with  the  budget  committee  many  times 
during  the  recent  session.  Many,  but  not  all,  of  the  appro- 
priation bills  of  the  recent  legislature  originated  with  the 
budget  committee.  In  one  day,  just  ten  days  before  the 
close  of  the  session,  ten  such  bills  were  reported  to  the  sen- 
ate by  the  committee.  Next  day  twenty-four  appropriation 
bills  were  passed,  two  of  which  had  not  originated  with  the 
committee.  Four  of  the  bills  were  defeated  in  the  house, 
which  had  already  voted  to  abolish  the  offices  named  in  the 
bills.  Appropriations  totaling  $138,000  were  passed  with- 
out being  reported  by  the  committee.  A  few  days  before 
the  close  of  the  session,  when  it  appeared  that  all  the  appro- 
priation bills  were  in,  the  auditorial  bureau  estimated  that 
the  appropriations  would  fall  within  the  revenue  by  $40,- 
000,  something  unheard  of  for  many  years  previous  to  1919. 

Notes  from  New  Mexico 

PREPARED   BY   CHARLES   F.    COAN 

University  of  New  Mexico 

The  Fifth  State  Legislature  has  not  completed  its  work 
at  the  time  this  is  being  written,  but  has  made  some  changes 
in  the  organization  of  the  government.  Thus  far  it  does  not 
seem  inclined  to  accept  the  recommendations  of  the  Special 
Revenue  Commission. 

TAXATION.  The  Special  Revenue  Commission  appointed 
by  an  act  of  the  Special  Session  of  the  Fourth  Legislature, 
made  its  report  November  20,  1920.  A  minority  report  was 
submitted  by  John  Joerns,  the  secretary  of  the  State  Tax 
Commission.  The  "Hearings"  held  by  the  Special  Revenue 
Commission,  August  16-20,  1920,  have  been  published.  The 
State  Tax  Commission  has  also  made  its  report  for  the  years 
1918-1920  in  which  it  submits  a  detailed  account  of  the  value 
of  property  in  the  State. 

The  Special  Revenue  Commission  has  recommended  many 
changes  in  the  government  of  the  State.    Some  of  these  are 


422      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

embodied  in  House  Bill  No.  100  (drawn  by  Professor  Cham- 
berlain), which  codifies  and  revises  the  taxation  and  revenue 
laws.  It  provides  for  the  assessment  of  all  property  includ- 
ing mines,  at  full  value  on  an  ad  valorem  basis.  (The  pres- 
ent laws  are  not  clear  on  the  point  of  full  value  assessment, 
and  mines  are  assessed  on  the  basis  of  production).  The 
bill  includes  a  two  per  cent  income  tax  at  a  flat  rate,  re- 
stricted to  individuals,  and  accompanied  by  an  exemption  of 
intangible  personal  property  from  the  general  property  tax. 

The  present  method  of  assessing  property  is  deemed  in- 
efficient by  the  Special  Revenue  Commission  and  the  State 
Tax  Commission.  At  present  certain  specified  properties 
are  assessed  by  the  State  Tax  Commission  consisting  of  one 
full  time  member  and  two  part  time  members,  while  the 
general  property  tax  is  assessed  by  the  elected  county  as- 
sessors. House  Bill  No.  100  provides  for  a  Tax  Commis- 
sion of  three  paid  members,  appointed  by  the  Governor,  who 
shall  have  complete  control  over  the  assessment  of  all  prop- 
erty. This  would  be  accomplished  through  five  supervisors 
of  assessment,  one  for  each  of  the  five  districts  into  which  the 
State  would  be  divided  for  purpose  of  taxation,  and  through 
the  county  assessors.  The  county  assessors  and  the  super- 
visors of  districts  would  be  appointed  by  the  State  Tax 
Commission.  The  Bill  provides  that  property  must  be  as- 
sessed only  after  a  personal  inspection  by  the  assessor. 

Many  printed  pages  have  been  devoted  to  this  subject  of 
taxation  during  the  past  year.  It  remains  to  be  seen 
whether  any  constructive  results  will  accrue  from  the  dis- 
cussion. The  State  Tax  Commissioner  has  stated  that  much 
of  the  property  held  by  small  holders  is  either  not  assessed 
at  all  or  under-assessed,  and  Professor  Haig  commenting  on 
the  present  mine  tax  law  writes,  "If  the  people  in  general 
fully  understood  the  present  mine  law  it  is  scarcely  conceiv- 
able that  it.  would  still  be  on  the  statute  books." 

EDUCATION.  The  Special  Revenue  Commission  in  its 
lengthy  report  devoted  a  chapter  to  the  subject  of  "State 
Institutions  and  Land  Oflfice."  They  recommended  the  crea- 
tion of  a  board  of  regents  to  have  control  of  all  state  edu- 
cational institutions  and  state  lands ;  the  consolidation  of  the 


Notes  fi'om  Neiv  Mexico  423 

three  normal  schools  into  one  or  two  as  seemed  advisable; 
and  the  merging  of  the  three  institutions  in  the  Rio  Grande 
Valley,  the  university,  the  agricultural  college,  and  the 
school  of  mines,  into  one  institution. 

Professor  Bagley  in  his  report,  made  in  February,  1921, 
to  the  Special  Revenue  Commission,  and  concurred  in  by 
Professors  Cubberley  and  Strayer,  emphasized  the  impor- 
tance of  training  teachers  as  the  basic  function  of  institu- 
tions above  secondary  grade ;  and  the  failure  in  the  higher 
schools  of  New  Mexico  to  meet  this  need.  The  figures  pre- 
sented showed  that  there  were  510  students  of  college  grade 
in  the  seven  state  supported  institutions,  200  of  whom  were 
from  outside  the  State.  Professor  Bagley  recommended  the 
discontinuance  of  state  support  for  the  Military  Institute 
at  Roswell;  the  Spanish  American  Normal  School  at  El 
Rito;  the  Normal  School  at  Silver  City;  and  the  School  of 
Mines  at  Socorro.  The  recommendations  made  concerning 
the  three  remaining  institutions — the  State  University  at 
Albuquerque,  the  Agricultural  College  near  Las  Cruces,  and 
the  Normal  University  at  Las  Vegas,  were,  first  the  con- 
solidation of  the  three  institutions  preferably  at  Albu- 
querque; and  second,  the  establishment  of  three  colleges 
each  with  special  characteristics  utilizing  the  plants  at  Al- 
buquerque, Las  Vegas,  and  State  College.  This  report 
strongly  recommended  that  there  be  but  one  board  of  con- 
trol under  any  plan  for  reorganization.  As  these  institu- 
tions were  created  by  the  State  Constitution,  a  constitu- 
tional amendment  will  be  required  to  make  any  change.  No 
action  has  as  yet  been  taken  by  the  legislature. 

HEALTH.  The  provision  for  the  continuation  of  the  work 
begun  by  Dr.  Waller  as  State  Commissioner  of  Health  is 
found  in  House  Bill  No.  80.  During  the  past  two  years  the 
salary  of  the  commissioner  has  been  paid  by  the  United 
States  Public  Health  Service.  The  present  bill  provides  for 
a  salary  of  $4,000  for  the  commissioner  to  be  appointed  by 
the  State  Board  of  Health.  This  bill  gives  the  commissioner 
wide  powers  in  matters  of  health  throughout  the  State — it 
also  provides  for  the  appointment  of  county  health  officers 


424      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

by  the  County  Commissioners  upon  the  approval  of  the 
State  Commissioner  of  Health  for  the  State. 

OTHER  MEASURES.  In  the  class  of  constructive  legisla- 
tion passed  is  the  act  creating  the  State  Game  Commission, 
which  is  an  unpaid  board  whose  officer  will  be  the  State 
Game  and  Fish  Warden  appointed  by  the  Governor.  The 
act  gives  wide  powers  to  this  commission  in  protecting  the 
fish  and  game  of  the  State.  However,  this  commission  will 
not  be  able  to  take  over  the  work  of  the  United  States  Bio- 
logical Survey  in  predatory  animal  control  because  it  will 
not  have  the  funds.  It  has  been  proposed  to  cut  oif  the 
state  appropriation  for  assistance  to  the  Biological  Survey. 

Several  acts  have  been  passed  for  the  relief  of  the  live- 
stock interests.  These  provide  for  thange  in  plan  of  sale 
of  state  leased  land,  in  price  paid  for  lands  leased,  in  the 
manner  of  purchase  of  State  land,  and  for  an  extension  of 
time  until  October  1922,  for  payments  due  the  State.  The 
wisdom  of  these  acts  has  been  questioned  by  some. 

The  Primary  Bill  introduced  by  the  majority  provides  for 
county  nomination  primaries  for  county  officers  and  dele- 
gates to  county  conventions  limiting  the  primaries  to  de- 
clared members  of  a  given  party,  but  the  primary  does  not 
extend  to  state  and  district,  officers  and  conventions.  The 
minority  has  introduced  a  state  wide  primary  bill.  It  has 
been  estimated  that  the  increase  in  cost  of  annual  elections 
under  the  county  primary  plan  will  be  $60,000. 

Some  state  offices  have  been  discontinued.  The  office  of 
legal  adviser  to  the  Governor  has  been  abolished.  The  same 
fate  was  met  by  the  New  Mexico  Mounted  Police,  a  state 
police  organization  primarily  for  the  prevention  of  livestock 
thefts.  The  office  of  county  road  superintendent  has  also 
been  discontinued. 

The  process  of  making  new  counties  has  not  yet  been  com- 
pleted in  this  state.  Socorro  county  had  some  15,000  square 
miles  until  Catron  County  was  created  out  of  the  western 
part  of  its  area  by  the  present  legislature. 

The  first  **Blue  Sky  Bill"  has  passed  the  Senate. 


Notes  from  Texas 


PREPARED  BY  W.  C.  BINKLEY 


In  Texas  the  legislature  meets  a  week  before  the  inaugu- 
ration of  the  new  governor,  and  during  this  period  practi- 
cally nothing  is  accomplished  aside  from  receiving  a  mes- 
sage from  the  outgoing  governor.  Governor  Hobby's  mes- 
sage emphasized  the  fact  that  much  constructive  work  had 
been  done  during  his  term  of  office. 

A  special  feature  of  the  inauguration  of  Governor  Pat  M. 
Neff  on  January  18th  was  the  presence  of  a  delegation  from 
the  new  government  of  Mexico,  consisting  of  General  Fran- 
cisco Perez  Trevino,  the  Mexican  Secretary  of  State,  to- 
gether with  the  governors  of  Chihuahua,  Coahuila,  Nuevo 
Leon,  and  Tamaulipas. 

Governor  Neff's  first  message,  submitted  on  January  20, 
contained  no  constructive  suggestions  aside  from  a  request 
that  the  promises  of  the  Democratic  party  platform  be  car- 
ried out.  A  few  days  later,  however,  he  proposed  a  general 
program  of  consolidation  and  elimination  of  various  de- 
partments in  order  to  cut  down  the  expense  of  handling 
the  state's  business.  Among  the  most  important  sugges- 
tions were  those  for  the  complete  abolition  of  the  industrial 
welfare  commission ;  the  transfer  of  the  work  of  the  state 
tax  board  and  of  the  tax  commissioner  to  the  railroad  com- 
mission and  the  comptroller ;  the  transfer  of  the  work  of  the 
mining  board  and  mine  inspector  to  the  Department  of  La- 
bor; the  consolidation  of  the  State  Health  Department  and 
the  Food  and  Drug  Department;  the  transfer  of  various' 
phases  of  the  work  of  the  Department  of  Agriculture  to  the 
technical  schools  of  the  state ;  and  the  assumption  by  the  De- 
partment of  Agriculture  of  the  functions  of  the  Warehouse 
and  Marketing  Department.  He  had  already  recommended 
the  abolition  of  the  board  of  pardons,  and  this  was  soon  fol- 
lowed by  a  request  that  the  entire  law  providing  for  the  sus- 
pended sentence  be  repealed;  that  the  governor  be  given 
power  to  remove  local  officers  who  are  not  efficient  in  up- 


426      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

holding  the  law;  that  the  prohibition  enforcement  act  be 
amended  so  that  conviction  could  be  secured  upon  the  testi- 
mony of  the  purchaser  alone ;  and  that  prosecuting  attorneys 
be  prevented  from  permitting  a  person  charged  v^ith  a  num- 
ber of  violations  to  plead  guilty  and  serve  all  his  sentences 
concurrently.  Next  came  a  recommendation  that  every  de- 
partment and  institution  using  the  state's  money  should  be 
sheared  of  its  discretionary  pov^er  in  regard  to  the  number 
of  its  employees  and  the  disbursing  of  money. 

Turning  to  the  work  of  the  legislature  which  adjourned  on 
March  12,^  it  is  found  that  its  members  were  not  in  complete 
sympathy  with  the  governor's  program  of  reorganization. 
Of  slightly  over  one  thousand  bills  introduced  during  the  ses- 
sion less  than  two  hundred  were  passed,  and  fully  half  of 
these  were  of  a  local  character.  Virtually  the  only  one  of  the 
governor's  proposals  to  meet  the  approval  of  the  legislators 
was  the  suggestion  that  the  Food  and  Drugs  Department  be 
consolidated  with  the  Health  Department,  although  the  sus- 
pended sentence  law  was  partially  repealed  in  that  automo- 
bile theft  and  criminal  assault  defendants  were  excluded 
from  the  benefits  of  the  statute. 

Among  the  few  measures  worthy  of  general  notice  are  the 
following : 

'  Providing  that  only  American  citizens  may  vote  at  elec- 
tions. 

Providing  for  absentee  voting  by  mail. 

Extending  the  term  of  the  Commission  of  Appeals  for  two 
years  from  the  date  of  its  expiration  in  June,  1921. 

Establishing  stringent  sanitary  regulations  for  hotels,  eat- 
ing houses,  and  bakeries,  and  fixing  the  size  of  loaves  of 
bread  in  multiples  of  sixteen  ounces. 

Restricting  Japanese  from  owning  land  in  Texas,  and  re- 
quiring the  registration  of  ownership  of  lands  in  the  state 
by  aliens. 

Repealing  the  minimum  wage  law  and  adopting  a  new 


lUp  to  the  time  of  going  to  press  the  House  Journals  for  the  last  two 
days'  sessions  have  not  been  printed,  and  it  is  therefore  impossible  to 
give  an  absolutely  accurate  account  of  the  work  of  the  legislature. 


Notes  from  Texas  427 

measure  prescribing  zones  for  different  minimum  wages  de- 
pending on  standards  of  living,  and  making  exceptions  in 
cases  of  localities  of  smaller  population. 

Granting  cities  of  less  than  5,000  inhabitants  the  right  to 
establish  the  commission  form  of  government. 

Authorizing  incorporated  cities  to  avail  themselves  of  the 
services  of  county  tax  collectors  and  assessors. 

Providing  for  the  organization  of  co-operative  marketing 
associations. 

Practically  nothing  was  done  in  the  direction  of  bringing 
additional  revenue  to  the  state's  treasury,  while  on  the  other 
hand  many  new  appropriations  were  made.  Most  of  these 
were  essential,  but  the  financial  condition  of  the  government 
makes  an  increase  of  income  equally  necessary.  Among  the 
more  important  appropriations  passed  were : 

$3,000,000  to  supplant  the  available  school  fund  and  aid 
in  keeping  the  per  capita  school  apportionment  to  $14.50. 

$4,000,000  for  the  rural  school  aid  for  the  next  two  fiscal 
years. 

$1,350,000  to  buy  135  acres  of  land  adjacent  to  the  pres- 
ent University  of  Texas  campus  for  the  use  of  the  Uni- 
versity. 

$1,500,000  for  establishing  a  tuberculosis  sanitarium. 

A  minor  appropriation  to  meet  the  state's  obligation  under 
the  Smith-Hughes  vocational  training  act. 

Provision  was  made  for  the  establishment  of  the  West 
Texas  Agricultural  and  Mechanical  College,  and  an  appro- 
priation was  made  for  this  purpose. 

Emergency  appropriations  amounting  to  approximately 
$1,000,000  were  passed,  but  the  governor  vetoed  a  majority 
of  such  appropriations. 

The  legislature  adjourned  without  making  any  appropria- 
tion whatsoever  for  the  maintenance  of  the  state  govern- 
ment and  state  institutions  for  the  next  two  years. 

Owing  to  the  fact  that  the  governor  has  until  April  1, 
to  veto  measures  passed  during  the  closing  days  of  the  ses- 
sion, it  is  impossible  to  say  what  measures  will  become  a 
part  of  Texas  law. 

The  taxation  proposals  introduced  by  Representative  John 


428      The  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly 

T.  Smith ^  did  not  prove  acceptable  to  the  legislature,  and 
nothing  was  accomplished  in  the  direction  of  taxation  re- 
form. 

A  proposal  to  move  the  University  of  Texas  to  the  Brack- 
enridge  tract  consisting  of  five  hundred  acres  of  land  lying 
along  the  Colorado  River  just  above  Austin  was  defeated. 

Plans  for  redistricting  the  state  for  purposes  of  represen- 
tation in  Congress,  and  in  both  houses  of  the  state  legisla- 
ture met  the  same  fate.  Of  special  interest  among  the  latter 
was  a  suggestion  that  the  lower  house  of  the  state  legislature 
be  reduced  to  sixty-two  members,  two  to  be  chosen  from 
each  of  the  thirty-one  senatorial  districts  of  the  state. 

A  resolution  providing  for  the  meeting  of  a  state  constitu- 
tional convention  was  defeated  in  the  lower  house. 

On  the  day  of  adjournment,  Governor  Neff  sent  a  message 
to  the  legislature  informing  the  members  that  their  failure 
to  make  the  necessary  appropriations  for  carrying  on  the 
government  forced  the  calling  of  a  special  session.  This 
session,  he  said,  would  be  called  late  in  the  summer  of  this 
year.  In  the  message  he  stated  that  he  would  again  submit 
to  them  his  plans  for  law  enforcement,  and  his  program  of 
efficiency  and  economy  in  the  administration  of  the  govern- 
ment. 

Personal  Notes 

Professor  C.  L.  Stewart  resigned  January  1  from  the  de- 
partment of  economics  and  sociology.  University  of  Arkan- 
sas, to  accept  a  position  with  the  Department  of  Agriculture, 
at  Washington,  D.  C.  He  will  assist  in  investigating  the 
system  of  tenant  farming  in  the  South.  His  place  in  the 
University  was  taken  for  the  rest  of  the  year  by  Mr.  J.  M. 
Gillenan. 

Mr.  E.  T.  Hiller,  formerly  of  the  University  of  Kansas, 
and  more  recently  connected  with  social  service  work  in 
Houston,  Texas,  has  been  appointed  an  instructor  in  sociol- 


iSee  Southwestern  Political  Science  Quarterly,  Vol.  I.  No.  3,  pp. 

283-294. 


Personal  Notes  429 

ogy  for  the  spring  term,  at  the  University  of  Texas. 

In  the  city  primary  election  of  March  21,  Hon.  A.  P.  Wool- 
dridge.  President  of  the  Southwestern  PoHtical  Science  As- 
sociation during  the  past  year,  and  formerly  Mayor  of  Aus- 
tin, received  a  majority  of  34  votes  over  Mayor  W.  D.  Yett 
in  the  race  for  the  office  of  Mayor.  Both  men  are  still  in  the 
contest  which  will  be  decided  in  the  regular  election,  April  4. 

Among  the  teaching  staff  of  the  1921  Summer  Session  of 
the  University  of  Texas,  are  the  names  of  Professor  Grove 
S.  Dow,  of  Baylor  University,  in  economics  and  sociology, 
and  Professor  F.  F.  Blachly,  of  the  University  of  Oklahoma, 
in  government,  for  the  first  term,  and  of  Professor  J.  P. 
Comer  of  Southern  Methodist  University  in  government  for 
the  second  term. 


INDEX 

Albes,  Edward,  The  Pan  American  Union 248 

American  police  systems,  by  R.  B.  Fosdick,  short  rev.  by  Sarah 

S.  Edwards 304 

Bass,  John  H.,  The  initiative  and  referendum  in  Oklahoma 125 

Beveridge,  Albert  J.,  The  life  of  John  Marshall,  rev.  by  D.  Y. 

Thomas 295 

Binkley,  William  C,  ed.  News  and  notes 408 

State  efforts  to  comply  with  the  Nineteenth  Amendment 266 

Constitutional  changes  in  the  1920  elections 412 

Blachly,  F.  F.,  rev.  of  Cleveland  and  Buck,  The  budget  and  re- 
sponsible government 195 

Municipal  home  rule  in  Oklahoma 17 

Notes  from  Oklahoma 65,  181,  281 

Blasco  Ibanez,  Vicente,  Mexico  in  revolution,  short  rev.  by  Sarah 

S.  Edwards 304 

Book  reviews e 79-94,  192-204,  288-302 

Budget  and  responsible  government.  The,  by  Frederick  A.  Cleve- 
land and  Arthur  E.  Buck,  rev.  by  F.  F.  Blachly 195 

Carman,  Harry  J.,  Insistent  problems  and  their  solution 241 

Central  American  Federation,  tran.  by  H.  G.  James 397 

Cleveland,  Frederick  A.  and  Arthur  E.  Buck,  The  budget  and  re- 
sponsible government,  rev.  by  F.  F.  Blachly 195 

Coan,  Charles  F.,  Notes  from  New  Mexico 279 

Cockrell,  Egbert  R.,  Municipal  home  rule  with  special  reference 

to  Texas 147 

Constitutional  changes  in  the  1920  elections,  by  W.  C.  Binkley. . .   412 

Controversy  over  Tacna  and  Arica,  by  H.  G.  James 155 

Crampton,  Ethel  M.,  The  executive  office  in  Latin-American  con- 
stitutions    380 

Cunningham,  Charles  H.,  rev.  of  Inman,  Intervention  in  Mexico. .   192 
Democracy  after  the  war,  by  J.  A.  Hobson.  rev.  by  Miriam  E. 

Oatman 196 

Economic  consequences  of  the  peace.  The,  by  J.  M.  Keynes,  rev. 

by  M.  S.  Handman 79 

Edwards,  Sarah  S.,  Short  book  notices. 202,  303 

Executive  office  in  Latin-American  constitutions,  The,  by  Ethel 

M.  Crampton 380 

Fenwick,   Charles   G.   Political   systems   in  transition.,   short  rev. 

Sarah  S.  Edwards 303 

Five  republics  of  Central  America,  by  Dana  G.  Munro,  rev.  by 

H.  G.  James 298 

(431) 


432  Index 

Foreign  rights  and  interests  in  China,  by  W.  W.  *Willoughby,  short 

rev.  by  Sarah  S.  Edwards 204 

Fosdick,   Raymond   B.    American   police   systems,   short   rev.   by 

Sarah  S.  Edwards 304 

Handman,  Max  S.,  The  Mexican  Revolution  and  the  standard  of 

living 207 

rev.  of  Keynes,  Economic  consequences  of  the  peace 79 

Hobson,  John  A.  Democracy  after  the  war,  rev.  by  Miram  E.  Oat- 
man 196 

Holcombe,  Arthur  N.,  States  as  agents  of  the  nation 307 

Home  rule,  municipal,  in  Oklahoma,  by  F.  F.  Blachly 17 

Home   rule,,   Municipal,   with    special    reference   to   the   state   of 

Texas,  by  E.  R.  Cockrell 147 

Initiative  and  referendum  in  Oklahoma,  The,  by  J.  H.  Bass 125 

Inman,  Samuel  G.,  intervention  in  Mexico,  rev.  by  C.  H.  Cunning- 
ham    192 

Insistent  problems  and  their  solution,  by  H.  J.  Carman 241 

Intervention  in  Mexico,  by  S.  G.  Inman,  rev.  by  C.  H,  Cunningham  192 
James,  Herman  G.,  Division  of  Latin- American  affairs. .   34,  155,  248 

Controversy  over  Tacna  and  Arica 155 

Meaning  and  scope  of  political  science 3 

tran.  Central  American  Federation 155 

rev.  of  Latane,  The  United  States  and  Latin-America 298 

tran.   Constitution  of  Uruguay 95 

rev.  of  Munro,  The  five  republics  of  Central  America 298 

John  Marshall,  Life  of,  by  Albert  J.  Beveridge,  rev.  by  D.  Y. 

Thomas 295 

Johns,  Clarence  D.,  The  relation  of  economics  to  history 372 

Keynes,  John  M.,  The  economic  consequences  of  the  peace,  rev.  by 

M.  S.  Handman 79 

Kimball,  Everett,  The  national  government  of  the  United  States, 

rev.  by  C.  P.  Patterson 92 

Latane,  John  H.,  The  United  States  and  Latin-America,  rev.  by 

H.  G.  James 298 

Latin-American  affairs 34,  155,  248 

Argentina 39,  171,  258 

Bolivia 40,  259 

Brazil 40,  259 

Chile 41,  172,  259 

Colombia 171,  260 

Costa  Rica 171,  261 

Ecuador 43,  171,  261 

Guatemala 44,  171,  261 

Haiti 262 

Honduras 262 

Mexico •. 44,  172,  262 

Nicaragua 263 


Index  433 

Panama.   49,  263 

Paraguay 49^  172,  264 

I*eru 49,  172    264 

Salvador 49^  I73 ,  264 

Uruguay 36,  50,  95,  264 

Venezuela 51,  265 

Legistative  notes  and  reviews 60,  174,  274 

Arkansas 60,  174,  277,,  418 

Lousiana I79 

New  Mexico 279.  421 

Oklahoma 65,  181,  281 

Texas 67,  184,  283,  424 

Life  of  John  Marshall,  The,  by  Albert  J.  Beveridge,  rev.  by  D.  Y. 

Thomas 295 

Mallison,  Albert  G.,  The  political  theories  of  Roger  B.  Taney 219 

Maxey,  Chester  C,  County  administration,  short  rev.  by  Sarah 

S.  Edwards 203 

Meaning  and  scope  of  political  science.  The,  by  H.  G.  James. 3 

Mexican  Revolution  and  the  standard  of  living,  The,  by  M.   S; 

Handman 207 

Mexico  in  revolution,  by  V.  Blasco  Ibanez,  short  rev.  by  Sarah 

S.  Edwards 304 

Miller,  Edward  T.,  Notes  on  taxation  for  the  states  of  the  South- 
west    275 

rev.  of  Smith,  Tax  bill  submitted  to  the  thirty-seventh  Texas 

legislature 288 

Municipal  home  rule  in  Oklahoma,  by  F.  F.  Blachly 17 

Municipal  home  rule  with  special  reference  to  the  state  of  Texas, 

by  E.  R.  Cockrell 147 

Munro,  Dana  G.,  The  five  republics  of  Central  America,  rev.  by 

H.  G.  James 298 

National  government  of  the  United  States,  The,  by  Everett  Kim- 
ball, rev.  by  C.  P.  Patterson 92 

Negro  faces  America,  The,  by  H.  J.  Seligmann,  rev.  by  D.  Y. 

Thomas 301 

News  and  notes 72,  174,  274,  408 

Oatman,  Miriam  E.,  rev.  of  Hobson,  Democracy  after  the  war. . . .   196 

rev.  of  Russell,  Proposed  roads  to  freedom 196 

Pan-American  Union,  The,  by  Edward  Albes 248 

Patterson,  C.  Perry,  ed.  News  and  notes 274 

rev.  of  Kimball,  The  national  government  of  the  United  States     92 

Political  science.  The  meaning-  and  scope  of,  by  H.  G.  James 3 

Political  systems  in  transition,  by  C.  G.  Fenwick,  short  rev.  by 

Sarah  S.  Edwards 303 

Proposed  roads  to  freedom,  by  Bertrand  Russell,  rev.  by  Miriam 

E.  Oatman 196 

Relation  of  economics  to  history.  The,  by  C.  D.  Johns 372 


434  l7idex 

Reuter,  E.  B.  Training  for  social  service  in  the  South 328 

^Review  of  the  minimum  wage  theory  and  practice  with  special 

reference  to  Texas,  by  W.  M.  W.  Splawn 339 

Rogan,  Octavia,  Legislative  notes  from  Texas 283 

Russell,,  Bertrand,  Proposed  roads  to  freedom,  rev.  by  Miriam  E. 

Oatman 196 

Seligmann,  Herbert  J.,  The  negro  faces  America,  rev.  by  D.  Y. 

Thomas 301 

Short  book  notices 202-204,  303-305 

Smith,  John  T.,  A  tax  bill  submitted  to  the  thirty-seventh  Texas 

•legislature,  rev.  by  E.  T.  Miller 288 

Southwestern  Political  Science  Association,  First  meeting 53 

Constitution 56,  121 

Tentative  program  for  second  meeting '. 275 

Second  meeting 408 

Splawn,  William  M.  W.,  Review  of  the  minimum  wage  theory  and 

practice  with  special  reference  to  Texas 339 

State  efforts  to  comply  with  the  Nineteenth  Amendment,  by  W. 

C.  Binkley 266 

States  as  agents  of  the  nation,  by  A.  N.  Holcombe 307 

Stewart,  Frank  M.,  Legislative  notes  and  reviews 60 

Stewart,  Frank  M.,  News  and  notes 72 

Straight  deal.  A;  or  The  ancient  grudge,  by  Owen  Wister,  short 

rev.  by  Sarah  S.  Edwards 202 

Tacna  and  Arica,  The  controversy  over,  by  H.  G.  James 155 

Taney,  Roger  B.,,  Political  theories  of,  A.  G.  Mallison 219 

Tax  bill   submitted  to  the   thirty-seventh   Texas  legislature,  by 

J.  T.  Smith,  rev.  by  E.  T.  Miller 288 

Tpxat:on  for  states  of  the  Southwest,  comp.  by  E.  T.  Miller 275 

Thomas,  David  Y.,  rev.  of  Beveridge,  Life  of  John  Marshall 295 

Notes  from  Arkansas 61,  174,  277 

rev.  of  Seligmann,  The  negro  faces  America ; . . .   301 

Training  for  social  service  in  the  South,  by  E.  B.  Reuter 328 

United  States  and  Latin  America,  The,  by  J.*  H.Latane,  rev.  by 

H.  G.  James 298 

Uruguay,  Constitution  of,  tran.  by  H.  G.  James 95 

Willoughby,  Westel  W.  Foreign  rights  and  interests  in   China, 

short  rev.  by  Sarah  S.  Edwards 204 

Wister,  Owen,  A  straight  deal;  or  The  ancient  grudge,  short  rev. 

by  Sarah  S.  Edwards 202 


THE 

SOUTHWESTERN  POUTICAL  SCIENCE 

QUARTERLY 


Managing  Editor 
C.  G.   Haines,  University  of  Texas 

Associate  Editor 
H.  G.  Jambs,  University  of  Texas 


Members  of   Editorial   Staff 

F.   F.  Blachly,   University  of  Oklahoma 

C.  F.  CoAN,  University  of  Texas 

M.  S.  Handman,  University  of  Texas 

D.  Y.  Thomas,  University  of  Arkansas 


VOLUME  I 
June   1920  —  March   1921 


AUSTIN.   TEXAS 

university    of    TEXAS 

1921 


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